Following the White Rabbit
by Mellifluence
Summary: It was only ever meant to be a job, and he's one of the best. What a pity the Point Man has forgotten that he is also nothing but a petty thief. -A foray into the moral implications of stealing dreams, and a Mark who changes... everything. Arthur/OC (Complete)
1. The Mark

_"Eames, I have a job for you."_

_"What, no 'how have you been these past eight months'? I'm pleased to see you too, Arthur darling."_

_"Pleasure's all yours. Look, are you in?"_

_"Depends on the job. What are we doing?"_

_"Extraction."_

_

* * *

_

**[The Mark]**

At 18:32 on a Thursday evening, a young, impeccably dressed man stood on the platform of the grand Penn station, waiting for the Amtrak Acela Express scheduled to pass through at 18:35. It was the last intercity train of the day to make the 3.5 hour journey from New York to Boston, and in a fedora, pinstripe suit and sleek metal briefcase in hand, the young businessman looked like a typical New Yorker who simply couldn't pry himself away from the desk to catch the 17.25.

(He, was, however, anything but.)

At 18:35 on the dot, the train streaked into the station. Smoothly, the man stepped into the carriage, his steps a little too purposeful to be simply choosing a seat. A few minutes later, just as the train began to pick up speed, he quietly stepped into Carriage D.

The carriage was already half-occupied. In one corner sat a young woman with a cup of coffee and large sketchbook resting on the table in front of her. With her dark hair, muted scarf and green beret, she appeared as though she had just stepped off the pages of a Parisian guidebook, and yet strangely at home in her current environment. In the stall opposite hers, a suave, older man was tapping away at his laptop, while his Indian companion occupied himself with a copy of the day's New York Times.

The newcomer did not spare them anything beyond a cursory glance. Instead, his eyes zeroed in on the final occupant in the furthest stall, a young woman whose face was partially hidden behind a long fall of raven black hair.

"Excuse me," he said.

She glanced up, meeting his dark eyes with a polite look of inquiry.

The man gave hesitant smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a manner that was as boyish as it was handsome. He gestured to the empty seat opposite hers. "Do you mind if I sit here?"

"No, please, go ahead," she replied, returning his smile with a warm one of her own before turning her attention back to the pages of her well-worn novel.

Flicking his eyes to the cover, the man's lips twitched, inexplicably amused at the irony.

In bold copperplate letters, the title read: 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'.


	2. The Chemist

"_Ever heard of Cho Jun Xiang?"_

"_The popular Hong Kong official?"_

"_The one. He's running for Chief Executive. The odds are that he'll be voted in."_

"_So what's the problem?"_

"_Let's just say that it is in the best interests of our contractor that he… doesn't. We've been hired to expose any compromising information that will cast Cho in an unfavourable light."_

"_You mean 'scope out the dirt'."_

"_The competition has reason to suspect that he's having an affair."_

"_Upstanding, model citizen Cho Jun Xiang is having an affair? That certainly is… compromising. So how are we going to get to him?"_

"_We don't. He's been trained – the chances of extracting any useful information from him are slim to none. We're going to need a more indirect route."_

"_Who?"_

"_Alice Cho."_

"_His wife?"_

"_No. His daughter."_

* * *

**[The Chemist]**

18:55, and all was quiet in the carriage, save for the rhythmic sounds of tapping fingers on a keyboard and the occasional rustle of pages.

When the Indian man got up, the girl with the book barely stirred as he passed, too engrossed in the witty, mad-cap banter of the March Hare and the Mad Hatter to pay him any heed.

It was the sound of a drink bottle – hers – falling to the floor that jolted her back to reality.

"Oh, excuse me!" the Indian man exclaimed, consternation visible on his round, jovial features as he gave chase to the wayward bottle he'd knocked over in his haste to get to the door.

Within moments, the iced tea was carefully set back in its original place on the table in front of her, even as profuse apologies spouted from the man's lips. The girl with the book merely smiled and waved away the incident – "It's alright, no harm done" – and with order re-established, very soon the carriage had returned back to its original tranquillity, nothing save the foam on the surface of the tea to belie the fact that it had ever been disturbed in the first place.

With her gaze returned to the novel, the girl with the book did not see the empty glass tube that was palmed into the man's pocket, or the meaningful glance he shot at his companion as she distractedly took a sip.

At 18:59, she was asleep.


	3. Act I, Scene I

"_Arthur! It's been awhile. Where's Dom?"_

"_Retired. You'll be hard-pressed to tear him away from his children, at least in the foreseeable future."_

"_That's understandable. So, what do you need me to build this time? That __**is**__ what you're here for, isn't it?"_

"…_Am I that predictable?"_

"_Was that a rhetorical question?"_

"_I was hoping I could interest you in a new project, Ariadne."_

"_Well, it **has** been awhile, and there's nothing quite like it, after all. So, yeah, count me in – unless there's a caveat?"_

"_No. Nothing too complex, but whatever you construct must be flawless. We're dealing with an apparently untrained, but very intelligent Mark, and after what happened in the Fischer project, I don't want to take any chances."_

"_Naturally. I'm too not keen on another trip to Limbo any time soon either. How many layers are we talking?"_

".._.Two."_

* * *

**[Act One, Scene One]**

In her favourite spot in the library, with the last rays of the afternoon sun tinting the dusty tomes around her in a warm, diffuse glow, Alice was certain – her current readings notwithstanding – that this was one of her favourite places in the world.

A slight movement to her left interrupted her quiet musings. Another student, she assumed, was settling down to study, and she couldn't help feeling a small twinge of annoyance at having 'her' workplace intruded upon. Alice wasn't quite sure what made her turn to look at the disturber more fully – the strangely familiar flash of silver cufflinks on a fastidiously ironed sleeve, perhaps – but soon she found herself gazing, as if from a half-forgotten dream, at an equally familiar but unplaceable face.

Brown eyes, questioning and confident beneath finely arched brows, turned to meet hers, and she suddenly found herself deer-in-headlights, caught in the act of staring. "Hi," she stammered out quickly, before promptly flushing at such a graceless greeting. "Do I..?"

Thankfully, the man cut in, saving her from more embarrassment. "I believe we may have met on the train, a few weeks ago?" he said, voice low and just shy of husky. "You read all the way through."

"Oh," she blinked, the memory coming back to her in a hazy rush. For some reason she couldn't recall exactly how she'd ended up here from there, but everything seemed to make perfect sense now. "Yes. Yes, of course."

An awkward pause.

"What are you studying?" the man asked at last, gamely picked up the threads of her short, rather oblique comments in an attempt to carry on the stilted conversation.

"Law," Alice replied easily, relieved she was no longer floundering over appropriate things to say. Despite her wariness of strangers, there was just something about this enigmatic man that piqued at her curiosity, and she found herself reluctant to let the conversation come to an end so soon.

Despite the awkwardness – Alice suspected that he wasn't the most comfortable with small talk either – he appeared to share the sentiment. "You know, I would have pegged you for something else. English literature, perhaps."

Enigmatic _and_ perceptive. Unbidden, a wry smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. "That would've been the infinitely more preferable option, yes."

The man nodded, and Alice watched as he set out his books and writing materials in precise, unhurried movements – 'the mark of an orderly man,' her mother would say in approving tones. Of course, it could also just as easily have been a sign of a control freak with borderline OCD tendencies depending on who you asked – but then again, Alice's roommate Joanna wasn't exactly a paragon of orderliness herself.

"So why aren't you?" he asked. "Studying English literature, I mean."

Alice shook herself away from her wayward thoughts to answer his question. "My father wanted me to study law, and I don't like to disappoint my father, as a general rule."

"But law isn't so bad, really," she added hastily, not wanting to paint her _Ba Ba_ as a tyrant – because he wasn't that at all, despite his sternness. Quickly, she pushed thoughts of her family away. "It's just… hard going, sometimes."

The man tapped lightly on a textbook laid out before him with a knowing smile. "I can sympathise."

Alice grimaced at the bold letters spelling out 'Corporate Governance Law and Practice' on the dark red cover. "Company law, then?" she guessed. That would explain the suits and his no-nonsense attitude.

"Not quite," he replied. "I'm writing my post-graduate thesis on intellectual property and the free market."

"Oh." She tried to think of something polite to say to that. "That's… interesting."

The man smirked. "It's mind-numbingly dull, actually."

"So why are you studying it?"

He looked at her meaningfully, arching his brow. "Why are you studying law?"

Alice laughed. "...Touché," she said, basking in the moment of feeling as though you could understand another person perfectly.

Another pause – less awkward this time – before Alice gasped. "I've forgotten to introduce myself," she said in dismayed tones. "My name is-"

"-Alice," her companion interrupted. "I know."

Her eyes widened. "How did you…"

His eyes flickered to the front of her folder, where 'Alice Cho' was scrawled in graceful cursive letters. Alice blushed. "…Oh," she murmured in realisation, before looking up at him, expectant.

The corners of his mouth twitched up in a way that suggested genuine amusement came so rarely he'd almost forgotten how to smile.

"Call me Arthur."

* * *

o0o

_Thoughts? Comments? _

_I apologise for the lack of action in this chapter, but I wanted to set the scene more, and let the reader come to a better understanding of who this 'Alice' character is. One of the chief problems I had with the otherwise amazing film was the distant, almost clinical feel of it. Some characters *coughARTHURcough* would have benefited from a little (a lot) more character development - at the very least, it would have made things a lot easier for us fanfiction writers... =P  
_

_Regardless, what do you think of Alice? I'm terrified she'll seem like too much of a Mary-Sue, and I've tried my very best to make it that she isn't, but PLEASE do me a favour and bonk me in the head if she looks like she's turning into one!_

o0o


	4. Act I, Scene II

o0o

**A/N:** I toyed with the idea of writing some scenes from Arthur's point of view, but in the end, I decided against it. Maybe when the story progresses, perhaps, but for now, I think it's better to keep it in the perspective of a character who knows nothing about dreamscaping, or extraction, or projections, and for the reader to come to his/her own conclusions about when Arthur is telling the truth and when he is lying. It's more fun that way, don't you think? =P

o0o

* * *

"_Alice Cho, born Cho Yue-Ling, age 21. Hong Kong resident of Chinese descent, only daughter of Cho Jun Xiang and wife, Liu Fei.  
It's unlikely that she will know the substantial details of his alleged affair, but even suspicion will give us a better lead than empty rumours."_

"_Wouldn't the wife make a better Mark than the daughter?"_

"_No doubt, but Liu Fei never leaves the house. I've come up with virtually no information on her, which is somewhat concerning."_

"_So what's the plan, exactly?"_

"_The Mark shares a very close bond with her father. Exploiting that should be easy."_

_

* * *

_

**[ACT ONE, SCENE TWO]**

"…Do you plan on specialising in family law?"

"Not… exactly," Alice replied, hands fisting nervously in her sleeves. She and Arthur had been talking in hushed, library-appropriate whispers for a while now, and with their shoulders brushing occasionally and Arthur's head bent to catch her muted responses, Alice had never been more conscious of the warm, dimly lit atmosphere of this isolated little corner. Had it always been so… intimate? "I'd… I'd like to be a mediator."

Arthur nodded, and there was something so attentive and patient about his manner that the usually reserved Alice felt a little less tongue-tied in his presence. "I don't like confrontation," she confessed. "I'd make an awful lawyer, I just know it. There's no way I could work in such an adversarial system. Why must there always be a winner and a loser when you can just reach a mutually beneficial compromise?"

"Why would anyone compromise if they know they have the upper hand?" Arthur countered with a graceful arch of his brow. "It's human nature to be selfish and greedy, even at the expense of others. You'd be hard pressed to change that."

"I think you need to have more faith in humankind."

The suddenly sardonic, distant gleam that appeared in his eyes made Alice a little uneasy. "What faith?"

She shook her head. "That's a very cynical thing to say, Arthur."

"And only an idealist would say that, Alice," he replied, but his tone was teasing, light, and immediately diffused the sudden tension in the room.

The clock struck five.

From outside the window, Alice heard the sounds of a student rally starting on the lawn. Shrugging it away – it was probably the Harvard CSA on one of their anti-abortion campaigns – Alice was surprised to see that this oddly seemed to bother Arthur a great deal.

"What?" she asked half-teasingly, wondering why he looked so discomfited. "Are you fiercely pro-choice?"

"Er… no, it's not that," he answered after a moment's pause, forcing a smile. "I don't actually have an opinion on the subject. I… well. I don't like crowds."

Alice nodded. She understood the feeling all too well. Having grown up in Hong Kong, the open spaces and two story houses in Boston had come as a welcome relief. (The bitterly cold winters, on the other hand…)

"Alice."

She glanced back at Arthur. He was looking down at his hands, deliberately avoiding her gaze.

"…Yes?"

His warm, brown eyes flickered back up to hers. "Are you hungry?"

Alice froze, staring at him with wide eyes. _Could he be…?_ Her heart began to race so loudly that she was sure he could probably hear it through her chest. "Um… I guess?"

"Dinner, then?" he suggested.

Alice found herself at complete loss for words.

Was this really happening to her? Was this intelligent, and sophisticated (and handsome – but she didn't want to think about that) almost-stranger interested in her enough to ask for a date? Alice knew she wasn't _bad_-looking by any means ('cute', the general consensus was), but she held no delusions about herself. She was reserved, bookish and rather traditional, and her parents had been so strict about her dating at school and she'd been so intent on her studies that she had never really learnt how to talk to boys, let alone flirt or attract attention to herself.

"Are you… asking me out?" she finally managed, blushing so hard she could feel the heat to the tips of her ears.

Arthur smiled, and it softened the corners of his stiff, serious-by-default features. "I'm trying," he replied wryly.

Alice bit her lip, trying to maintain a dignified, ladylike calm. Before she could give her faltering assent however, she was cut off by the tinkling notes of Debussy's_ Arabesque_.

"Sorry," she murmured embarrassedly, hurriedly fetching her cell phone from the purse by her feet, silently cursing at whoever was ringing at such an inopportune time.

'Mr. Wong', Caller-ID flashed.

Alice frowned.

Why was her father's secretary calling _her_?

* * *

_o0o_

_And the plot finally thickens...! _

_Arthur, Arthur, Arthur... as much as I love the guy, he IS a con-man. 'Inception' made that very clear. I'm sure he's not deliberately trying to wreck people's lives, going by the 'It's just a job, and someone has to do it, so why not me?' philosophy, but hopefully, he'll come to see the error of his ways... Or maybe that's wishful thinking?_

_Also, for those of you who would like a more visual idea of what Alice looks like, I imagined someone like Aoi Miyazaki in my mind. (I think she and Arthur would make a cute couple, no?)._

_**Remember, authors love reviews!** Don't hesitate to tell me if I'm veering off track with the tone of the story or if the characters are starting to look OOC!_

_o0o_


	5. Act I, Scene III

"_Let me get this straight. Are you telling me that you plan to __**seduce**__ the girl into spilling the beans?"_

"'_Seduce' is hardly the right word, Eames. Placed in such a vulnerable position, the Mark will have no one but me to turn to for help. It should be easy under the circumstances to gain her trust and perhaps charm her—-what?"_

"_Oh, don't mind me, Arthur. I'm simply trying to put 'you' and 'charm' in the same sentence without sniggering."_

"…_Any more witty quips you'd like to share with us, Eames?"_

"_Plenty. But continue, Mr. Bond. I'm sure I can stave off my laughter for a little longer."_

_

* * *

_

**[Act One, Scene Three]**

"I'm sorry, I have to take this call," Alice murmured hastily to Arthur. She stood up, turning to one side as she flicked open her cell phone's sleek white lid.

"Hello?" she answered in rapid Cantonese before belatedly remembering that the British-educated Mr. Wong preferred to communicate in English. Reverting back again, she added hastily, "Yes, Mr. Wong?"

"Miss Cho." The gruff reply was grave, although the clipped British tones sounded more polished than ever. "I regret to inform you of some very bad news."

Alice froze, immediately thinking of her father. "_Ba Ba_!" she said urgently. She recalled the phone call he'd made to her those weeks ago (had it really been so long ago?) when she'd been in New York City. There was an upcoming conference in L.A. that he needed to attend, he'd said. "Is my father okay?"

"There was a… car accident, on the way back to the hotel." Mr. Wong replied slowly, as if he was choosing his words with deliberate care. Which, considering the circumstances, he probably was. "Mr. Cho is in ER now. The situation does not appear, well, ideal."

Alice felt numb. When she was younger, her parents had made her go through courses in emergency protocol, in preparation for situations such as this. But no course could have prepared her for the news that her father could be dying as they spoke – and the horrifying realisation that she was hundreds of miles away.

"Miss Cho?" Mr. Wong's worried voice crackled over the phone after a minute had passed with nothing but a chilling silence hanging between them.

When Alice finally spoke again, her voice was curiously flat. "Which hospital?"

"The Kaiser Foundation."

"Thank you, Mr. Wong."

"Of course, Miss Cho. I will be in touch. If there is anything I can do, please call. See you soon."

Slowly, Alice snapped the phone shut, her arm falling limply to her side. She didn't realise she was pitching dangerously forward until she was steadied by a pair of strong, bracing hands. "Alice?"

"Alice, look at me." The voice was more urgent this time.

"Huh?" she mumbled. Slowly, Arthur's worried face and intense, dark eyes swam back into focus. "Oh. Arthur."

"What happened?" he demanded.

Alice bit her lip. "My father's been in a car accident. It's… not looking good. I need to get to L.A. immediately." She giggled, absurdly amused at her next thought. "Guess I won't be going to dinner with you tonight."

Despite the gravity of the situation, a part of her couldn't help but feel a little disappointed at that.

Alice shook her head of those ridiculous notions. "Excuse me, Arthur," she murmured, breaking away from his grip. "I need to get to the airport. It was nice meeting you though."

"Wait," he said, hurriedly slipping on his expertly tailored suit jacket. "My car's parked outside. I'll drive you."

"You don't need to do that," she tried to protest. "I can hail a cab."

"Alice, you look like you're about to faint," he said bluntly.

She forced a smile. "I'm alright, really."

Arthur shot her another disbelieving look. "Of course you are."

"Look," he said, more gently, when she still looked like she wanted to protest. "It's the least I can do."

Alice wavered. "Are you sure this won't be taking you away from any other commitments?"

"Apart from a dinner that I'm taking a raincheck on, no."

"But…"

"Alice." His voice brooked no arguments.

Her shoulders slumped, the fight leaving her. "Okay." This time, the smile she shot him was genuine, and infinitely grateful. "…Thank you, Arthur."

In a manner that was as steadying as it was chivalrous, he placed a guiding hand on the small of her back.

"Let's go."


	6. Act I, Scene IV

"_I'm relieved, Arthur darling. I was afraid I'd have to learn Cantonese."_

"_Rest assured, Eames, I'm well aware of your limits."_

"…_Your confidence in me is flattering, truly."_

"_Have you done your research?"_

"_I tailed the target for two weeks. Forging the secretary should be a walk in the park."_

"_Good. Because I also need you to do something else…"_

_

* * *

_

**[Act One, Scene Four]**

The library was oddly empty for a week-night. The few students that _were_ present, however, all looked up as she and Arthur passed, and there was something rather unnerving in the way that they stared, unblinkingly, pinning her with their eyes as they quickly made their way to the doors.

No – not at _her_ – she soon realised, after she'd self-consciously checked to make sure there wasn't toilet paper stuck to her foot or something similarly embarrassing.

They were staring at Arthur.

'How curious,' Alice thought to herself. 'Why would they-?'

As if he could sense the question bubbling to her lips, Arthur spoke. "Do you need to grab anything from home before heading for the airport?"

His question immediately brought more pressing concerns back to the forefront of her mind. "No," she replied after a moment's thought, immensely relieved that they'd left the staring people behind as they walked out into the chilly night air. "Nothing I can't get in L.A. on short notice."

The sounds of the student rally were growing louder on the turf. It appeared as though the protesters were preparing to march. Arthur led her in the opposite direction, heading towards a quieter street which ran just behind the stately old library. "My car's just there," he said, indicating to the shiny black Mercedes-Benz parked on the corner, a model strongly reminiscent of a classic 60s convertible. Somehow, Alice wasn't the least bit surprised. It seemed just the thing that the equally sleek and old-fashioned Arthur would have picked out. Smoothly, he opened the door on the passenger side and Alice nodded her thanks as she quickly slid in.

The events of the next few seconds happened very fast.

With his attention on her, Arthur was caught completely unawares by the tall, masked man who leapt at him from behind the innocuous white van parked just behind them. One brutal cuff to the head later, and Arthur went down. Alice had no time to scream before she was dragged out of the car by another masked man, shorter and fatter than the first. A large, meaty hand clamped around her mouth, muffling all sounds of struggle as she fought desperately in his grasp.

"Gotcha," he rasped, before shooting a glance at the unconscious Arthur. "What're we gonna do with him? The girl was supposed to be alone!"

"Bring him along," the other said. "We've done what we've been paid to do. _They_ can decide what to do with the extra."

Alice's head spun. Who _were_ these people? What did they want with her? Cursing herself for wearing her pretty but supremely useless silver ballet flats on the one day stilettos would have come in handy, Alice only had time to land one wild kick at her attacker's kneecap before a sharp knock was dealt to the back of her head.

She felt cool liquid splashing on her face and the scent of foreign chemical compounds coiling in the air – and then everything went black.


	7. Act II, Scene I

**[Act Two, Scene One]**

When she finally came to, it took a few disorientating moments for Alice to realise that she was conscious again, and that her impaired vision was actually due to the lack of adequate lighting in the room and not because she'd suddenly gone blind. Her head pounded in a particularly excruciating manner, and there was a half-numb, half-throbbing feeling in her arms – arms, as she all-too-painfully discovered when she made a cautious attempt to shift them, that were bound and roughly tied behind her back.

_Where on earth was she?_

The warm surface she was leaning on shifted slightly, and Alice gave a shriek of surprise that was easily muffled by the large gag over her mouth.

Walls did not move.

…Or talk in Arthur's voice.

"Alice?" he tried, but it came out more as an incoherent grunt beneath the equally thick layer of fabric wound over his mouth. Alice took some liberties in the interpretation though, and answered with a muffled grunt of her own. Both were seated on the floor, having been tied back-to-back with their hands caught in the middle, connected by the same irritating piece of rope that Alice now wanted no more than to hack into tiny pieces.

Arthur attempted to speak again, punctuating his words with a nudge of his arms. It took a few more nudges, followed by grunts that grew increasingly more frustrated before Alice realised that he wanted them both to stand up.

When Alice had been eight years old, her father had taken her on a holiday to Macau – a way, perhaps, of assuaging his guilt for missing her birthday two years in a row. Her younger self had been awed by the pretty buildings, the spectacular firework displays, and the friendly street performers who were always happy to take a picture with an excited little girl with a gap-toothed grin. But most of all, Alice remembered the dancers and acrobats, who could twist and turn and move so effortlessly in near-impossible ways. They'd made it seem so easy.

Forced now, thirteen years later, to perform a similar feat, Alice realised that it was anything but easy – or effortless. Attempting to stand with her hands tied behind her back and bound to another person who was suffering in exactly the same way only added to her swiftly growing collection of bruises and gave her a whole new appreciation for those Macau acrobats she'd admired as a child. Frustrated, exhausted and a second away from breaking out a particularly colourful (albeit muffled) string of Cantonese curses, Alice had been ready to give up altogether before their trial-and-error efforts finally paid off and she miraculously found herself and Arthur back in an upright position, panting for breath.

Hesitantly, she bumped her fingers into his. 'What now?' she tried to communicate, hoping he'd a better plan than she did to extricate them out of this mess. A strict Hong Kong education coupled with the training her mother had insisted on in classical piano and ballet had pronounced her "accomplished" enough, but Alice suddenly found herself wishing that she'd taken lessons in something a little more… well, useful. (Escapology came to mind.) She was fairly certain that none of her etiquette classes had covered 'what to do in non-hypothetical hostage situations', and her white cotton dress, while appropriately ladylike to please her instructor, wasn't exactly the best storage place for conveniently placed knives. …If Alice, of course, had actually been in the habit of carrying knives on her persons in the first place.

Apparently Arthur did – or something of the general sharp and useful persuasion, Alice hoped – as he began to strain his arms (and hers, being so attached) towards the left pocket of his pants. A few more awkward movements later saw a triumphant Arthur successfully extracting out a small Swiss pocketknife from its depths, but not before the back of Alice's hand had most thoroughly familiarised itself with some rather… inappropriate places. Mortified and supremely thankful for the darkness that hid her engine-red cheeks, Alice was quite certain that she'd never be able to look at the back of Arthur's pants the same way again.

Cutting through their bonds took far longer than Alice would have liked, but at long last, the stubborn ends of the rough-hewn rope had fallen to the ground, and her hands were free to untie the wretched cloth gag from her mouth. Alice heaved a sigh of relief. Her muscles screamed with every move, but never had she appreciated her freedom of movement more.

"Are you hurt?" Arthur's disembodied voice cut smoothly through the darkness. If she strained her eyes, Alice could make out the general outline of his straight-backed figure, a few paces from where she stood.

"I'm fine." Alice replied. Her hands stung in a few places where Arthur's blade had nicked by accident, but things could have been much worse, given the circumstances. "How's your head?" she asked, recalling the sickening blow that he'd been dealt.

"I'll live."

It was said in so dismissive a tone that Alice couldn't help but worry more. "Are you… sure?" she tried again.

"Trust me," he replied dryly. "I've had far worse."

Alice blinked. "Worse?"

What could straight-laced and obviously wealthy Harvard student Arthur have done to merit "far worse"? At least, he didn't seem like the type who got into regular fistfights...

"Never mind," Arthur said quickly, retreating back into more distant tones. He clearly wasn't willing to broach the subject. "I'm fine, honestly."

Alice said nothing, suddenly remembering that for all his charm, Arthur was still very much a stranger to her. An awkward silence descended upon the pair, before Alice decided to do something more constructive than stupidly standing around. Hesitantly, she reached out, feeling her way around the room in a half-hearted attempt to gain her bearings – and from the shuffling sounds that she heard in Arthur's direction, it appeared as if he was doing the same. Dusty barrels and chilly glass bottles met her fingertips, and she gathered that they were in a wine cellar of some sort.

"Alice," Arthur spoke up again. "Is Cho Jun Xiang your father?"

His abrupt question brought memories of her father's accident rushing back up again, and Alice fought a sudden fit of panic before the more rational side of her tampered it down.

'Worry about _Ba Ba_ later', it told her sternly. 'Focus on getting yourself out now.'

_But, oh God, he could be __**dead**__…_

"Yes." she said, forcing the insidious voice away to answer Arthur's question. "He is."

_Is. Present tense._

"He must be important."

"I suppose..." she said, wondering where this was going. "He's a state official, reasonably popular. There were rumours that the Election Committee wants him as the new Chief Executive, but I haven't being following it as closely as I probably should."

There was a pause as Arthur digested this information – or at least, that's what Alice assumed he was doing. The generally impassive Arthur was even more difficult to read when she couldn't see his face.

"Listen," he finally said. "I heard the men talking on the way here, when they'd thought me still unconscious. Their employer wants access to Cho Jun Xiang. They knew where you'd be. They were simply waiting for the signal that you'd been lured out."

Alice blinked. "Do you mean to say," she said slowly, "That the phone call was the lure?"

"It's likely."

Despite these worrying revelations, Alice hardly dared to allow herself to hope. "So there was no car accident?" she whispered.

Her father was okay. _Ba Ba_ was okay. But that meant…

Her eyes widened. "Mr. Wong deceived me."

Alice didn't know what to think.


	8. Act II, Scene II

**[Act Two, Scene Two]**

The first time she'd walked in on her parents fighting, Alice had been twelve years old. It'd been an ordinary Friday afternoon, not long after she'd finished school, when she'd opened the front door of her house to the pervading sense of something being very, very wrong.

"You need help!" her father was shouting, and Alice had tightened her grasp on her backpack in alarm. _Ba Ba_ never shouted. "I'm trying to help you!"

"Help? You want to send me to God-knows-where and you call that help?" Even from the doorway, Alice could hear her mother's angry sobs. It was the first time Alice had ever heard her cry.

"Liu Fei-"

"—You can't make me leave! This is my house as much as it is yours! You can't make me leave!"

Alice didn't stay to hear the rest. Her English test paper, with its 100% scrawled over in red ink, fell forgotten on the doormat as she'd turned tail and run, consumed with the need to _just get away_.

It had been pure chance that she'd run – literally – into her father's secretary, on his way to deliver some urgent documents to his boss. In the middle of the sidewalk and utterly out of his element, with an armful of crying girl and absolutely no clue on how to handle the situation (this wasn't part of the job description, he was certain), Mr. Wong had done the only thing he could. "There, there, Miss Cho," he attempted mechanically, handing her an immaculately starched handkerchief from his lapel pocket. "Here, I'll walk you home."

"NO!" she cried out, startling an elderly woman walking on the other side of the road. Her pigtails whipped from side to side, smacking her face painfully with the speed of her movements.

Mr. Wong hastily held up his hands. "Okay, okay, not home then." Dismayed, he'd had glanced around, desperately seeking for inspiration (or was it divine intervention?) to quieten the crying Alice. Catching sight of a street-vendor nearby, he'd quickly bought her an ice-cream.

Alice remembered thinking how childish it'd been – after all, ice-cream would've made everything better had she been five, not _twelve_ – but as the icy, sweet taste of red bean and vanilla flooded her tongue to replace the salty residues of tears in her mouth, somehow, Alice felt inexplicably comforted.

Gradually, sobs turned to sniffles, and sniffles to the blowing of her nose. Obvious relief spread over Mr. Wong's face and he noticeably relaxed in his seat on the park bench beside her. "Do you…" he began awkwardly. "Do you want to talk about it, Miss Cho?"

'_Please don't'_, his face said.

As Alice stared up at the man who'd she'd known almost all of her life, the unobtrusive, loyal shadow who'd tailed her father and always nodded at her politely at the office when she visited (she was always "Miss Cho" with him, never "Yue-Ling" or "Ling-Ling" or "Alice"), suddenly, she felt something like a dam breaking inside, and the words came tumbling out.

She told him about the perfect score on the English test at school which she'd been so eager to show her mother – who'd been so distant and so quick to snap at her these days that Alice was trying extra-hard to please to compensate – and then the alarming fight that she'd walked in on after _Ba Ba_'s driver, Mr. Zhao, had dropped her home after school. And Mr. Wong, with his lightly greying hair and awkward mannerisms and staid, serious features, had simply sat and listened, a wispy but comforting presence by her side. Alice had been struck with his similarity to those tin soldiers her younger cousin collected in neat rows on his bookshelf, like the sad one from the fairy tale who loved a paper ballerina and suffered so much but never got his happily-ever-after.

"Everyone fights sometimes," he replied at last, after they'd fallen into a long silence. "I'm sure… I'm sure your parents love each other very much, just like they love you, and that it's all blown over by now."

He said it with such quiet assurance that Alice almost believed him.

"Why don't I take you home?" Mr. Wong tried again. "They'll sure to be very worried about you now."

So Alice had let herself be led back and ushered back into that large and imposing house, where her father exchanged quick, quiet words to his secretary before sending him off and shutting the door.

"Ling-Ling," he'd immediately asked. "What did you say to Mr. Wong?" Even then, _Ba Ba_'s public image had been his first and foremost concern.

Head bowed, Alice had admitted quietly that she'd told Mr. Wong she'd witnessed them fighting.

Her father's eyes narrowed. "Did you tell him everything you overheard?"

She shook her head. "..._Ba Ba_, are you mad at me?"

He sighed. "No, I'm not mad at you, _bao bei_." Bending down to convey the importance of his next statement, he gazed at her with grave, serious eyes. "But next time, remember not to air dirty laundry where others can see it, understand? Family matters are private matters."

She nodded. Even at twelve, Alice had been a perceptive, obedient girl. It would never happen again.

"…Are you and _Ma Ma_ getting a divorce?" she asked hesitantly, dreading the answer.

Her father reached out, patting her gently on the head. "No, Ling-Ling. We aren't getting a divorce. But your _Ma Ma_ is… ill, so you have to be a good girl and not upset her, alright?"

Alice nodded again.

"Will she be sent away?"

He sighed. "No. But your Auntie will be coming to stay with us, to help us look after _Ma Ma_. At least temporarily." Ruffling her hair lovingly, he continued. "Don't worry, Ling-Ling. Everything is going to be just fine."

And to the twelve-year-old Alice, everything had been. Soon after, Auntie had moved in, and she never heard her parents fighting again. And though he'd never mentioned the incident and Alice never really spoke privately with Mr. Wong ever again, she never forgot his awkward kindness and the ice-cream he'd bought to comfort her when there'd been no one else to turn to.

.o.

_But this phonecall…_

Brought back to the present, Alice attempted to push away her blossoming suspicions with the vehement shake of her head. "Mr. Wong can't have been involved. He must have been deceived himself."

Because it didn't make any sense. Mr. Wong was like a particularly distant uncle – frugal with his affections, but not uncaring.

_There was just no way…_

Arthur remained silent.

"Mr. Wong would never betray _Ba Ba_!" Alice cried, although she wasn't sure who she was trying to convince – Arthur, or herself. "He's proved himself fiercely loyal for over fifteen years! Why would he betray my father?"

"Money? Power?" Arthur countered, as blunt as ever. "Incentives enough for any man, however loyal, to turn on his employer."

"He was my father's most trusted colleague," she was quick to argue. "And my father rarely trusts anyone."

Arthur gave a humourless laugh. "I think you'll find," he said. "It's the ones you place your trust in that hurt you the most."

The bitterness in his voice made Alice wonder whether he was speaking from experience… or as a warning to her. Again, she wondered how much Arthur was really holding back from her.

But Alice said nothing. Until there was further evidence to support the contrary, she refused to presume Mr. Wong as anything but innocent. After all, even criminals were given that right, she reasoned, and Mr. Wong, who'd never shown himself to be anything but reliable, deserved at least that.

Thoughts of her father's secretary were immediately pushed aside when her questing fingers suddenly met with what appeared to be the frame of a door, and Alice searched blindly until she finally found the cold metal of a doorknob. "I found a way out!" she cried triumphantly, although it disappointedly (but wholly unsurprisingly) refused to open. "...Except it's locked."

"Let me see," Arthur said. Despite knowing that he was heading her way, Alice still jerked when his fingers brushed against her back.

"Sorry," he murmured, before moving in front of her to inspect the lock.

A long moment passed.

"Do you have a hairpin on you?"

Alice reached up, extricating a bobby pin from her loose and no doubt now messy bun. Placing the innocuous item in his outstretched hand (located with some difficulty), Alice asked with some scepticism, "...You know how to pick locks?"

Her own hands occupied themselves with retying her hair, twisting it back up and out of her face in quick, mindless movements.

"I was bored over the summer," Arthur replied wryly. "It seemed like an interesting challenge."

Alice smiled. She imagined it would be.

Amusement quickly faded as the sounds of metal on metal reached her ears. Her mind automatically raced ahead, devising plans and contingency plans to cover each 'worse-case scenario' that they would likely meet on the other side.

More tinkling, and then a click. With a creak, the door slowly swung open.

Alice tensed, preparing for the worst, but they were only met with more darkness.

"Ready, then?" Arthur asked.

Alice took a deep breath. "…Ready as I'll ever be."

* * *

_o0o_

_So there you go, a little bit of backstory to the lovely Alice. It's clear she loves and respects her parents very much, but every family has their own skeletons in the closet, no? _

_(As an aside: any theories on what illness her mother suffered/is suffering from? ...Don't worry! I promise it's nothing stereotypically terminal as frequently depicted in Taiwanese and Korean dramas... or all that central to the general plot of this story.)_

_**Glossary/trivia:**  
1. Bao bei = darling/precious_  
_2. The fairy tale Alice recalled is a nod to Hans Christian Andersen, and his beautiful and bittersweet "The Steadfast Tin Soldier"_  
_3. In Asia, 'secretaries' (probably a poor translation of the title but I couldn't think of a more appropriate one) to important people often have a job with more prestige than those in the West. They are a mixture of PR manager, PA and secretary. It's generally quite a trusted position._  
_4. Likewise, having a chauffeur (like Mr. Zhao in this story) is often the rule, not the exception. Most execs and officials with even a little bit of power (e.g. a departmental head, or a sub-editor-in-chief) will have a personal driver, as a perk of the job._

**_As always, reviews and concrit are appreciated!_**

_o0o_


	9. Act II, Scene III

**[Act Two, Scene Three]**

The doorway they'd discovered was surprisingly small. Even the petite Alice, who barely reached 5'2" on a good day, had to stoop considerably in order to fit through the tiny wooden frame. Rough stone walls and the uncomfortably low ceiling of a narrow passageway scraped against her cautiously extended fingertips as Alice stepped through, stumbling blindly into the thick, cloying darkness.

"Careful," Arthur said lowly, a few paces in front of her. "There's a step."

Alice took heed. By edging her foot out to test the ground before her, she managed to ease herself onto the next step without tripping over the elevated ledge. Slowly, they ascended the staircase in silence, hunched over almost double to avoid knocking their heads on the low ceiling. Alice could only imagine how uncomfortable it must be for the much taller Arthur, but not once did she hear him grumble or curse or hit his head. The man exuded grace, even in the most awkward of situations.

Without a light to guide them, the passage seemed to go on forever. The sudden, stomach-dropping feeling of anticipating a step that was not there was the only warning Alice had of finally reaching level ground.

And still the passage carried on.

Alice sighed. Secret passageways, she decided, were definitely not what they were cut out to be. Mystery novels always made them seem so glamorous, but now, trapped in a real, honest-to-goodness one herself, Alice wanted nothing more than an instant (and preferably safe) way out.

It seemed as though her prayers were answered, for Arthur came to a sudden standstill in front of her, stopping so abruptly that Alice narrowly missed stumbling into him.

"We've hit a wall," he said, by manner of explanation. "With luck, it's an exit, and not a dead end."

"Is there a lever or a lock of some sort?" Alice asked.

A pause, and then- "Found it," he said. With an ominous creak, the wall slid open.

Alice blinked, momentarily blinded by the bright light flooding into the dusty passageway where they stood. Thankfully, Arthur's figure blocked out most of glare.

"Where are we?" she whispered nervously, half-expecting someone to jump out and discover them at any given minute.

"Come and see," he replied, ducking out to let her through. "There's no one around."

.o.

As her eyes adjusted to the light, Alice found herself in a lavishly decorated suite of rooms, in the rose-gold tones, antique mahogany edges and rich velvet hues of the Gilded Age. Heavy embroidered drapes fell from the expansive floor-to-ceiling windows, and the air was thick with the opulent scent of rose-oil and potpourri, emanating from the numerous – albeit patently decorative – scented candles scattered around the room. All of this Alice merely skimmed over, as she turned to glance back at the way they'd come.

What she saw made her lips twitch in wry amusement.

"…A bookcase?" she asked, watching with a rather bemused air as Arthur carefully pushed the redwood shelf of aged Shakespearean texts back into place, seamlessly hiding the dark passage to the cellar from view. "How… Agatha Christie."

Occupied with dusting his hands off, Arthur simply quirked a brow at her. As she took in his striking appearance in the bright, golden glow of the room, Alice was stunned to see that from the tips of his slicked-back hair to the hem of his fitted Armani suit, Arthur looked as impeccable as always, with nary a hair or crease out of place. There was nothing to suggest that he'd been beaten, tied up and thrown into a wine cellar, and had, only seconds before, emerged from a secret passage that probably hadn't been cleaned out for centuries.

_How on earth did that man manage to __**do**__ that?_

For a second, Alice fought between the desperate urge to check herself in comparison and sheer reluctance to see the very-likely (and wholly unpleasant) result. In the end, however, curiosity won out over caution, and she slowly trailed her eyes down her body, certain that her delicate cotton dress must now resemble a sooty grey rag than the high-end design it was.

But it, too, was as pristine and white and unwrinkled as ever.

_**How-**_

Alice didn't have time to dwell on the utter mystery of it all, because Arthur was suddenly grabbing her by the arm and pulling her into a corner as the sound of fast-approaching footsteps and coy laughter grew louder and louder on the opposite side on the heavy oak door. The pair dived behind an upholstered loveseat and not a moment too soon, for with the clumsy turn of the doorknob, the door swung open and a couple tumbled through, all arms and legs and graceless tangle of entwined limbs.

Peeking out from behind a strategically placed red velvet cushion, Alice saw what a truly striking pair the intruders made, the woman fair and the man dark, both statuesque and handsome in their own right. Both were dressed in the extravagant costumes for what must have been a masquerade ball – a ball that was very much still in full swing, if the sounds of distant music and conversational chatter curling through the open entrance were anything to go by.

The sounds of revelling and laughter were abruptly cut short as the man backed the woman into the door, the weight of their bodies slamming it shut. Immediately, the man dove for the woman's neck, planting open-mouthed kisses along the creamy expanse of skin as his hands skimmed over the ample curves of her breasts and hips. She moaned in response, hooking a long leg around his waist as she arched wantonly into his touch.

With a barely audible squeak, Alice whipped around and averted her gaze, moving so fast that she almost knocked heads with the nearby Arthur. Bright red and feeling like a voyeur who'd intruded on something that she most definitely shouldn't be seeing – or hearing – Alice bit her lip and tried to ignore the amorous noises and sounds of discarded clothing falling to the floor. And to think, she'd thought watching a love scene in the cinemas with her parents to be mortifying enough…

To her utmost relief, the couple decided to spare Alice from bursting a blood vessel, choosing to move into the adjoining bedroom instead of unwittingly subjecting the runaway hostages to a front-row viewing of their more passionate… activities.

The bedroom door slammed. A long, awkward silence fell on the two remaining in the room.

"Well, that was… unexpected," Arthur said, breaking the silence. There was carefully suppressed amusement in the tone of his voice, as if he was silently laughing over a joke only he knew the punch-line to.

Flushing even harder – as if **she'd** been the one he'd walked in on doing… doing _that_ (as ridiculous as the feeling was) – Alice gazed fixedly at everywhere but Arthur's face. "We should go," she said, in part to steer them back to the more pressing concern of escape, but mostly just as an excuse to change the subject. "We can't stay here forever."

"True," Arthur replied, the teasing note not yet gone. "Who knows what else we might find?"

Alice glared. She'd appreciate this unexpected revealing of an actual sense of humour from Arthur if it hadn't appeared at her embarrassed expense.

Blithely, he stood up, moving silently to the window to peer cautiously out into the darkness beyond.

"Can we escape via the window?" Alice wondered.

"Not unless you fancy a three-story jump," he replied.

Emotions now in check, Alice, too, stood up, weaving deftly around the articles of clothing strewn about the soft, carpeted floor to slowly crack open the door from whence the couple had come. It led to a long corridor, as richly decorated as the suite they currently hid in, and the odd guest drifted and chattered and mingled in small groups and intimate pairs along its length.

There was no way they could walk out without attracting attention to themselves.

Easing the door closed and locking it for good measure, Alice told Arthur as much. "We need some sort of… some sort of disguise," she said.

Two pairs of eyes fell to the dress and the discarded Venetian masks at the same time.

"Do you think she'll miss it?" she wondered guiltily. Privileged from birth and denied very little all her life, Alice never thought there'd come a day where she'd be seriously contemplating theft.

Arthur glanced at the bedroom door, before flicking his eyes back to her. "Not for a while, I'd imagine," he replied dryly.

Alice blushed. She really didn't need _that_ reminder. "Um, okay then..." She bit her lip, searching for a good place to get changed without been seen. Maybe if she ducked behind the couch…

Wordlessly, Arthur turned around, offering her a modicum of privacy as best as the circumstances allowed. Shooting surreptitious looks at his rigid back, Alice hastily slipped out of one white dress and into another, still warm from the actual owner's lingering body heat. It wasn't that she didn't trust Arthur, of course, it was just… well, she'd never gotten changed in the presence of a strange man before, and she didn't want to take any chances.

Very quickly, though, Alice realised she had a problem on her hands.

"…Arthur?" she called out.

He misinterpreted the questioning in her voice for chastisement. "I promise I'm not peeking," he said, still facing the door. It was said in so impassive a tone that Alice could almost believe that he wasn't being cheeky.

_Almost._

"No, it's not that," she said, stammering slightly over her next words. For the umpteenth time, she wondered how she'd managed to get herself into such a bizarre situation. "It's just… c-could you lace me up?"

Arthur turned around.

With hands crossed modestly over her chest to keep the bodice from falling down, Alice looked back over her shoulder at him with hesitant eyes.

"…Sure," he said, after a pause, the barely perceptible tic of his jaw the only thing that belied his discomfort.

Alice's heart beat faster as she felt him draw close. From the corner of her eye she saw one of his hands reach out to rest lightly at her waist, the other coming to fumble at the complex criss-cross of laces at her back. From the awkwardness at which he picked at them, Alice gathered that this was just as new to him as it was to her. Somehow, the thought made her feel slightly less vulnerable as the bodice began to tighten over her slim and less-than-curvaceous frame.

Glancing down at herself, Alice couldn't help but admire the beautiful costume. Soft white feathers lined the bodice, and the puffy tulle skirt was embroidered with a scattering of tiny crystal beads that glittered in the light, as if a million water droplets had been caught within its densely layered depths. As short as Alice was, the dress fell to just below her knee rather than at mid-thigh, oddly reminiscent of the tutu the prima ballerina had worn in her dance school's rendition of _Swan Lake_. However promiscuous the owner of this dress was, Alice had to admit that she had taste.

Her sartorial musings were interrupted by the accidental brush of Arthur's hand along her exposed spine, and the slight shiver that shook Alice's frame wasn't because the touch had been cold (or unwelcome - but she'd never admit to that, of course). Standing as close as he did, Alice could feel his warm breath tickle the fine hairs on the nape of her bare neck with each quiet exhale, and it did nothing to calm the racing of her heart.

His hand lingered a second longer on her waist than was strictly necessarily before Arthur finally stepped away, task complete. Alice quickly bent down, picking up the dainty feathered mask that completed her ensemble in an attempt to regain her sense of equilibrium. Slipping it on, she gave herself a self-conscious final brush-over before taking a deep breath and turning around. "...How do I look?" she asked.

"You should let your hair down," Arthur replied. "You'll be harder to recognise, at least from faraway."

Swiftly, Alice pulled out the tie that kept her hair up, shaking the long locks loose so that it fell in gentle waves around her face. "How's that?"

There was a strange look in Arthur's eyes.

"…Arthur?" she tried again.

He blinked, and the look was gone. "You look lovely," he said perfunctorily, as he, too, picked up the black velvet mask on the parlour table and slipped it over his face. "Shall we?"

She smiled, graciously accepting his proffered arm as if they were both going out to attend a party, and not to make a mad break off the premises. "We shall."

* * *

_o0o_

_*gasps* Our pure, virginal Alice has projections like that? I wonder what Freud would say about **that**... =P  
_

_**Trivia**_  
_1. The narrow doorway is a nod to the Alice of Lewis Carroll's 'Alice in Wonderland', who, at the beginning of the story, finds a key to a door that is too small for her to fit through._  
_2. Agatha Christie is a popular writer of crime/mystery novels_.  
_3. The Gilded Age was a period in American history of rapid economic growth (c. post-Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras). The wealthy were very wealthy, and they loved to show it in any way they could._  
_4. At the end of the chapter, Alice is dressed as Odette from 'Swan Lake'. With a background in ballet, one would expect some of the projections' costumes to be ballet-inspired._  
_5. In contrast, Arthur's mask is too plain to give him a particular role, but I suppose he could be either Prince Siegfried or the sorcerer Rothbart =P in line with the 'Swan Lake' theme. _

_**Reviews are love!**_

_o0o_


	10. Act II, Scene IV

**[Act Two, Scene Four]**

If there was one game Alice was good at playing, it was 'Let's Pretend'. After all, she'd been playing it most her life.

It was her father who'd taught her the rules. She'd been barely six then, sobbing because the bigger girls down the road had stolen her favourite doll, and Cho Jun Xiang had sat her on his knee and told her, without preamble, just how much of a little fool she was. It had been the complete lack of sympathy in his voice, rather than the words themselves, that had shocked her into silence.

"They stole your doll because you were any easy target. And by running home crying, you let them see just how much power they have over you," he'd said, though not unkindly. These were big concepts for a little girl, but Alice listened very carefully indeed, knowing that her father only spoke like this when what he was saying was very, very important. "But if you pretend that it doesn't hurt then they can't hurt you, you see? You are a still lake – reflecting everything, revealing nothing. So smile, Ling-Ling. There's a good girl."

And so Alice smiled. She smiled at the girls who stole her favourite doll, pretending their taunts the next day didn't affect her at all. She smiled at the boy at school who only said he liked her to date her best friend, and the boy whom she'd liked that never even knew her name. And later, when her mother became a woman with a stranger's eyes and 'home' was the last place she wanted to be, Alice kept smiling, pretending – for her father's sake, and her mother's sake, and perhaps, her own sake – that life was perfect and she was blissfully happy and absolutely nothing – nothing – was wrong. Because her father was a public man, an important man, and people needed to see them smile.

"_Smile, Ling-Ling. There's a good girl."_

Calling upon her father's words, the smile came easily to Alice's face as she exited the lavish suite with a light hand on Arthur's arm, even though her palms were sweaty and she was terrified, certain that they'd be caught. It was a wide, carefree smile, too genuine to be real, but it proved to be enough as they'd swept down the corridor with no one the wiser.

Alice's deliberately untensed shoulders relaxed a fraction when they turned the corner and ducked into a more private alcove at the end, which opened out into an expansive mezzanine view of the dazzling ballroom two stories below. Enormous crystal chandeliers hung from the frescoed, gilded ceilings, the light bouncing off and reflecting back from each glittering, transparent surface like a thousand miniature golden suns. Large mirrors on the walls only magnified the ostentatious, surreal quality of the extravagant room, and the marble floor was already densely packed with costumed guests in all manner of colourful finery. Although the wine was plentiful and the music frenzied, everyone appeared to be behaving with perfect decorum and social grace, much to Alice's relief. She didn't think she could handle a repeat incident like one in the suite they'd left behind.

"If we mingle with the guests, we should be able to find an exit on the ground level where we can slip out undetected," Arthur murmured, the muted tones giving his voice an almost sensuous quality as it whispered against her ear. Alice's lips parted, her body immediately reacting to light graze of his lips and the heated breath of his mouth, while her mind fought desperately for clarity and reason. To any passer-by who chanced upon them standing there, Arthur, with his arm lightly around her waist and his head dipped low against hers, appeared to be just another gentleman whispering sweet nothings to his lady friend. "There's a door on the other end which leads into a garden. It's probably our best bet, but we have to get to it first."

Alice nodded, breaking away from Arthur's half-embrace as she led them both to a winding iron-wrought staircase that opened out into a discreet corner of the ballroom below. When she could trust herself to speak in a reasonably normal, steady voice, she looked up at Arthur and asked, "…You can dance, right?"

By then they'd reached the bottom of the staircase. Arthur merely bowed in response, slowly backing her into the room as the pianist struck up a waltz. His arms came around her, and then they were dancing.

Brightly masked people blurred into kaleidoscopes of brilliant colour and ambient noise as Alice was whirled around the dance floor. As the clock hands on the north wall edged closer to the thirteenth hour, Alice pushed aside her worries and lost herself to the music.

'Chopin's Grande Valse Brilliante in E-flat major', she thought blissfully, closing her eyes as Arthur dipped her with the beat. She didn't realise she'd actually spoken out loud until she opened her eyes to find him staring down at her with brows raised, a droll, questioning look in his eyes.

Alice blushed. "I like classical music," she explained defensively. "I grew up listening to the late-classical and romantic composers, although my father was always more partial to Beethoven than Chopin and Tchaikovsky. This piece has always been my favourite Chopin waltz, but I never got good enough on the piano to play it."

"It's nice," Arthur conceded, moving them strategically towards the far garden exit. "But I prefer jazz myself – Gershwin, Ella Fitzgerald, Edith Piaf. ...French opera, too, on occasion."

He twirled her smoothly, before pulling her gently back into the circle of his arms. "You don't seem surprised," Arthur commented, when Alice only gave a noncommittal hum in response.

She smiled. Caught up in the moment, an uncharacteristically arch response slipped out before her brain could censor it. "…I'd have been surprised if you said you were a closet fan of Britney Spears and Japanese death metal."

Immediately, she winced, cursing her audacious roommate's sarcastic humour and biting wit. She hadn't realised how much of Jo' was starting to rub off on her, and she prayed that Arthur wouldn't take any offence.

To her surprise, Arthur just chuckled. It was such an unexpected, refreshing sound that she instantly wished she could capture it, but like a particularly delicious scent, it was gone as quickly as it had come, and just as elusive to bottle.

"Well, if you put it that way..."

As she was twirled around again, Alice caught a flash of black from the corner of her eye. Dressed head-to-toe in pressed black suits and their eyes covered in large, ominous shades, six men who could only be security were beginning to close in on them from different corners of the room. Immediately, Alice tensed, leaning forward to whisper urgently in Arthur's ear. "Arthur, I think we have a problem."

"Relax," he said, having noticed the men as well. "Don't react. Don't let them know you're aware of them." Acting upon his own words, Arthur continued to spin them around the floor as if nothing was wrong. Only Alice felt the deliberate turning in their dance, as Arthur guided them faster and faster towards the garden exit.

Their plans were foiled by the appearance of another security personnel, who cut them off from the side. Forced to retreat, Arthur had no choice but to back them towards the only space that was free, a darker corner of the room where the heavy drapes cloaked the guests gathered there in long, half-moon shadows.

Alice gulped, watching from around Arthur's shoulder as the men moved closer and closer. They were unobtrusive enough that none of the other guests paid them any heed, but Alice could see that they had a very clear goal in mind.

_-Them._

Arthur and Alice had been discovered.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_**Trivia:**_  
_1. The ballroom design is inspired by Sarah's peach-induced dream sequence in the cult fantasy Bowie film 'Labyrinth'. If you haven't seen it - GO DO SO._  
_2. Apparently, or so my professors have told me, time doesn't follow a regular pattern in dreams. Clockfaces either do not change, or will change so dramatically that the characters or numbers on them become unrecognisable - hence, the clock with thirteen hours. (...Actually, I lie. It was just an excuse to sneak in another 'Labyrinth' reference =P)_  
_3. Chopin's Grand Valse Brilliante in E-flat major is one of his most well-known and beloved waltzes, and, as Alice has expressed, damn difficult to play. Of course, Chopin's waltzes are more suited to performance than actual dance, but hey, it IS Alice's favourite piece, and anything can be stretched in dreams, right?_  
_4. The security personnel are dressed in much the same way as the bodyguards in classic Hong Kong film noir. _

**_Please review and let me know what you think! I can bribe you with... um... a virtual cookie?_** =P

_o0o_


	11. Act II, Scene V

_o0o_

_**A/N:** Okay - so you'll either love me or stab me with a pitchfork for this, but I swear I have an explanation for everything at the end of the chapter. Please don't kill me before then!_

_o0o_

* * *

**[Act Two, Scene Five]**

"What are we going to do?" Alice whispered, her eyes darting to and from the six fast-approaching, professionally menacing men. They could risk making a run for it, of course, but there was no guarantee they'd actually manage to get very far without being dragged back kicking and screaming by the ends of their hair. Besides, even if they miraculously made it off the grounds, Alice had no idea where they were. For all she knew, they could be miles away from help, civilisation or even a decent phone line. Maybe if they stole a car...

But they had to get out of the ballroom first, and that, at present, was looking rather dicey.

"I hope you have a better plan than 'run for your life'," she hissed _sotto voce_ to Arthur. He'd backed them as far as they could go, and Alice, confined in his warm arms with the contrastingly cold wall at her back, didn't know whether she felt more protected – or trapped. "Because that's the only thing I can come up with on short notice."

Arthur didn't reply for several beats. He darted a quick glance at the men, before glancing back down at Alice with something unrecognisable in his eyes. With his face as impassive as ever, the next words that tumbled from his lips were as out-of-the-blue as they were outrageous.

"Quick, give me a kiss," he said.

…_That_ Alice did not expect.

It was such an uncharacteristic thing for Arthur to say – the words too smooth and too practiced to be spontaneous – that, despite her shock and sudden nervousness, an incredulous laugh erupted from her lips.

"Do you use that line on every girl you meet?" she asked, channelling all the coy avoidance tactics from the idol dramas she'd seen on TV in order to buy her brain time to get past the _oh-my-God-did-he-just-ask-me-to-kiss-him?_ and figure out the more imperative _what-the-hell-do-I-DO?_.

With her hands flat against his chest, she felt, rather than saw, him twitch, and Alice knew her words must have hit the metaphorical nail on the head. Although Alice didn't particularly like the idea of being 'just another girl' to Arthur, the mental image of the uptight, conservative man going around kissing random girls in this fashion was so absurd that she couldn't help giggling, despite herself.

The confused, almost put-out look that flashed across his face was indication enough that whatever reaction he'd expected from Alice, **this** was definitely not one he'd been hoping for. In the end, Alice was saved from working out what to do altogether, when Arthur himself dipped his head down and captured her smiling lips with his.

The giggles abruptly died in her throat, swallowed by the light meeting of skin-on-skin. Alice's eyes widened as he tilted his head closer to deepen the contact, before they slowly slid shut, the overwhelming physical sensations instantly replacing the shock she felt. The kiss was simple, and gentlemanly, but his lips were soft and ever-so-careful against hers, and suddenly, it was as if everything else – the room, the people, the entire situation – had dropped away. There was only her, and him, and this kiss.

'More', her body cried as it unconsciously melted into him, but all too soon Arthur was drawing away, breaking from intimate connection to rest his forehead gently on hers. He was so close she could see the amber flecks in his brown eyes, and the tiny freckle that dotted the side of his nose where the mask didn't quite cover.

"…You do know that this is the most commonly used diversion trope in the romance genre, right?" Alice whispered breathlessly when she'd finally found her voice, parroting the words that her English professor at Cambridge would surely be snapping at this very moment. Professor Behn had loved nothing more than to poke fun at the trashy Harlequin novels so many of her students had secretly enjoyed reading. Strangely, it was the only coherent thought running through her mind at that moment.

A rare, lopsided smile blossomed on Arthur's face, crinkling at the corners of his eyes. The expression was so endearing in its sheepishness that it sent another wave of butterflies fluttering madly through Alice's stomach. "Well, I'm not exactly known for my originality," he replied dryly. "…Is it working?"

The heavy hand that suddenly clamped over Arthur's shoulder was answer enough. It instantly shook Alice from her kiss-induced stupor to the very real danger they both now faced.

"Excuse me, sir—" the security guard began.

He never had the chance to finish the sentence.

In one smooth motion, Arthur released Alice, spinning around to punch the man squarely in the face. Before anyone had the time to react, he was already reaching for the hefty bronze vase on the tea table to their right. With one arching throw, it sailed over the crowd, smashing into the nearest chandelier with a deafening crash.

Millions of dollars of Swarovski crystal rained down like hail as pandemonium broke loose on the dance floor. Panicked screams filled the once carefree room as the guests raced for cover, tripping over each other in their haste to get to the doors.

"It never does work," Arthur commented blandly, before grabbing Alice by the wrist and pulling her towards the exit. "…I think your plan sounds like a very good one, right about now."

Amidst the chaos, he and Alice disappeared.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_*Hides behind the desk, cowering* ...Should I expect pitchforks, or is everyone squee-ing with joy?_

_I know I've stolen such a central line to the Ariadne/Arthur ship and re-interpreted it for my own devious purposes, but I couldn't resist - I'msorryI'msorryI'msorry! Regardless of how it came to be, the question now is: what's the underlying motive? Did Arthur kiss her because he's beginning to see her as more than a Mark, or is it all just "part of the plan"? ...Even I'm not sure any more, although me being cynical, I suspect it's the latter..._

_Anyways, for all fluff-lovers out there, I hope this chapter will tide you over, because things will start to get very... not-fluffy from here. Party's over, peoples! Now the real fun begins... ;)  
_

_**Trivia:**_  
_1. Professor Behn is named after Aphra Behn (1640-1689), lauded as the first professional female writer in English literature.  
2. In the States, unlike some parts of the world, law is a post-graduate degree. Because of this, Alice attended Cambridge as an under-graduate before being accepted into Harvard Law School._  
_3. Asian idol-dramas are a bundle of fun. Most people watch them to perv on the hot actresses and/or actors, regardless of the quality of acting (in)ability. I recommend the Taiwanese 'Devil Beside You' (starring Mike He and Rainie Yang) and the infamous Korean 'Boys Before Flowers' to see said coy avoidance tactics in action. =P __  
4. Swarovski is an Austrian luxury brand of beautifully cut crystal jewellery, sculptures and chandeliers.  
5. Harlequin is a publisher of romance novels of the nauseating pink-cover persuasion._

_Edit: Alice's roommate has been renamed to Joanna (Jo). I didn't expect how much more of a role she'll end up playing, but as a result, I had to develop a more detailed backstory for a character that is turning out to be more than 'the roommate' with a name that no longer suited her. I apologise for the confusion this may have caused.  
_

_o0o_


	12. Act II, Scene VI

**[Act Two, Scene Six]**

Despite the lateness of the hour, the air outside was surprisingly warm. Light dew had settled over the landscaped lawns, and the long blades of grass were cool and wet against her bare ankles as Alice and Arthur raced towards the cover of the bushes further in the distance.

Sounds of the party faded away in the still night air when they burst into the rose garden, panting heavily for breath. Here the path narrowed, and dangerously sharp thorns entwined around the fragrant red and white blossoms on either side of the path, the moonlight tinting the velvet-soft petals in shades of midnight and blue.

There was no sign of their pursuers.

.o.

"You know," Alice said thoughtfully, after she'd caught her breath. "Those guards seemed pretty polite. I don't think they wanted to hurt us, and they didn't look like they were carrying weapons, which is unusual, given their job. Maybe we could negotiate with their employer?"

Arthur stared at her for a long moment.

"…You always see the best in people, don't you?" he finally asked.

Alice wrinkled her nose. "You say it like it's a bad thing."

Arthur shrugged, if the almost imperceptible twitch of a shoulder could be considered a 'shrug'. Alice had never seen him actually shrug before, and she didn't expect to any time soon. It seemed like a supremely un-Arthur thing to do. "It is, if you're the self-preserving type," he replied. "People rarely, if ever, live up to your expectations, and if you give them a chance to benefit themselves by hurting you, they will."

Listening to his bleak, almost callous words, Alice was struck by how much Arthur reminded her of her father in that instant. Cho Jun Xiang, too, had written off the human race, perhaps as a result of all the corruption and greed he'd encountered festering beneath the whitewashed clockwork of the bureaucratic system he worked in. Alice desperately wished she knew what'd caused Arthur to become so cynical and embittered at so young an age, but something held her back from asking. It wasn't her place to pry.

"Maybe you're right, but I'll take my chances," she said instead. "In my experience, most people just need someone to give them the benefit of the doubt."

"…The benefit of the doubt?" he echoed, the scepticism bright in his voice.

"Yes," she replied softly.

Alice thought of the girls who she taught English to, in the juvenile detention centre not far from where she lived. When she had first signed up to volunteer in the tutoring programme that the government had set up in hopes of raising numeracy and literacy rates among delinquent youth, it'd been to help herself more than anything else. She wanted to be braver, and stronger, to be more forceful and self-assured like so many of her peers were, like Joanna was. And so she'd gone, heart in her mouth, to stand terrified amongst a group of sullen, mocking girls with eyes too old for their years. 'Go back to where you come from, little rich girl. You don't belong here.'

The last thing they'd wanted was to learn from her.

For months, nothing Alice said or did seemed to get through. But she persisted, week after week, doggedly appearing every Saturday morning, and gradually, what had been just a particularly distasteful but necessary duty for her turned into genuine compassion and concern. More often than not, these girls had experienced –and often committed – more cruel and neglectful and violent acts than Alice, with her sheltered, privileged upbringing, could even begin to comprehend. And even though most of her students never got past their hatred and resentment, there were a few that began to respond to Alice, as time wore on. It was slow, and it was gradual, but they began to think about turning their lives around, of making something of themselves.

Somewhere along the way, these girls had lost hope in themselves because the system had lost hope in them. But they weren't evil people, or even bad people, necessarily. Just… lost. And Alice knew without a doubt that her reluctant students had taught her more about life, and hope, and second chances than anything they'd ever learnt from her. Tara, and Eileen, and Isabella and Stacy – they were proof enough that there was still hope yet, however mortal and deluded the world was.

"If you give people a chance to do the right thing, there's always a chance that they will," Alice said, her words gaining momentum. "Not everyone chooses to hurt others to benefit themselves."

"And you honestly believe that?" Arthur asked. Both had dispensed with their masks during their flight from the manor house, and it only made the derision that flashed in his eyes all the more obvious.

"Everyone deserves a chance, Arthur," she argued doggedly, even though she knew very well that her words were falling on deaf ears. It would appear that they would have to agree to disagree on this point. "Sometimes, you just… have to have faith in people."

Arthur simply stared at her. There was a completely unreadable expression on his face.

"…What?" she asked self-consciously.

"Nothing," he said, turning away. "I'm simply trying to work out whether I find that incredibly admirable or exceedingly naïve."

Alice laughed. "Go with exceedingly naïve. Most people do."

Even Arthur had to smile at that. As she watched the curve of his lips turn upwards, Alice was suddenly reminded of where that mouth had been, not too long ago.

Now, no longer madly running for her life or reacting to immediate danger, her heart abruptly caught up with her head as the full force of what'd happened hit her in the gut. Immediately, the blood rushed to her face, and her hand reached up reflexively to touch her lips.

Lips that Arthur had _kissed_.

"Alice?" Sensing the sudden change in her demeanour, Arthur gazed down at her, concern evident in his eyes.

"…You kissed me," she said dazedly.

Arthur shifted awkwardly. "About that…" he answered, clearing his throat. "I might have taken undue advantage of the situation. I didn't know what I was thinking. -I _wasn't _thinking."

Alice blinked dreamily, still half-lost in her own thoughts. "…It was my first kiss," she murmured, before suddenly realising how pathetic that sounded. She was twenty-one years old, for goodness sakes! Hastily, she babbled out an explanation. "Well, there was this incident in third grade, so it wasn't technically my first kiss, but—"

Arthur looked pained. "Alice-", he began.

"No, don't," she said, cutting him off. She knew he was going to apologise. She didn't want him to apologise. "It was the heat of the moment, I understand." She bit her lip, unable to meet his eyes. "…It-it doesn't have to mean anything."

Instead of assuaging his guilt as she'd hoped, her words only worsened the situation. The lines on Arthur's face deepened, as he, too, looked away.

"Look, Alice, I—"

Whatever he'd planned to say was cut off by a sudden movement in the bushes in front of them. Both Alice and Arthur froze, as whatever had been hiding there moved out of the shadows, revealing the deceptively frail figure of the elusive Mr. Wong. Silver-framed spectacles glinted in the moonlight, hiding the expression in his narrow eyes.

"Well, well, Miss Cho." The subservient tones in his perfectly amicable voice were chillingly mocking. "So this is where you've been hiding."

If Alice had been looking carefully at his face, she would have realised that something was somewhat off about the lines of Mr. Wong's jaw, the tilt of his nose.

But Alice did not look up.

Instead, her attention was completely caught by metallic gleam of the revolver he held in one hand.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_**Trivia:**__  
1. The red and white roses - a reference to the Red Queen in 'Alice in Wonderland', who demanded her servants to paint the white roses in her garden red as she hated their original colour.  
2. The line "... however mortal and deluded the world was." is inspired by the beautiful Santayana quote: "The world is not respectable; it is mortal, tormented, confused, deluded forever, but it is shot through with beauty, with love, with glints of courage and laughter, and in these, the spirit blooms timidly, and struggles to light amid the thorns."  
3. Similarly, the line "You just have to have faith in people." is my take on the words of the ever-optimistic, chirpily ditsy Kaylee in the sci-fi/western series 'Firefly' - "You just gotta have faith in people.". 'Firefly' is one kick-ass series, by the way. Never have I seen a TV drama was a better ensemble cast and wittier lines. WATCH IT.  
4. Alice's fixation on the gun is a typical example of the "weapon's focus effect" (Loftus & Burns, 2001). Weapon focus is when a witness to a crime diverts his or her attention to the weapon the perpetrator is holding, thus leaving less attention for other details in the scene and leading to memory impairments later for those other details. Which means, if you want to rob a bank and reduce the likelihood of someone recognising you later on, carry a gun. Even a fake one will suffice. =P_

_o0o_


	13. Act II, Scene VII

**[Act Two, Scene Seven]**

"Mr. Wong," Alice said shakily, a noticeable tremor in the small hands that gripped desperately at the fabric of her dress. "Is this all your doing? Was the phone-call, everything about _Ba Ba_'s accident, just a ruse to kidnap me?" Desperately, the irrational, optimistic side of her hoped he would deny her sharp allegations; that he would tell her what she wanted to hear despite all evidence pointing to the contrary.

Instead, the man just laughed. "You've always been a smart girl, Miss Cho. When did you figure it out?"

"Why are you doing this?" she asked pleadingly, question-for-question. "What do you want with me?"

Mr. Wong smirked. "What I want is very simple," he replied. "I want a little piece of information about your precious _Ba Ba_, and you're going to help me get it."

"My father trusted you! I trusted you!" she cried. "Why are you doing this?"

"I've been Cho Jun Xiang's secretary for over fifteen years," he replied, for all the world sounding like he was chatting to her over tea. "And I confess, I am growing rather tired of the position. It's a dull, thankless job, and I should very much like to see what life's like on the other side of the desk."

"I'll never help you!" she said fiercely, although the quaver in her voice betrayed her fear.

Mr. Wong laughed. "How quaint, presuming that you actually have a choice in the matter." Raising his arm, he levelled the gun at Alice. "Extraction may require you to be alive, my dear, but no one ever said that you had to be in one piece."

With the same cruel smile on his face, he cocked the gun and pulled the trigger.

.o.

Distantly, Alice heard someone scream her name, but it was lost in the deafening sound of a gunshot firing and the blood roaring in her head. Alice closed her eyes, expecting the excruciating impact of a bullet tearing through muscle and bone marrow, but instead, all she felt was the scrape of the rocky, pebbled ground as she was shoved to one side, the force of the sudden movement sending her sprawling.

When she could finally see past the stars in her eyes, Alice saw Mr. Wong standing over a keeled-over Arthur, who was gasping in short, wheezing pants. His hand was pressed against his right shoulder, and when he withdrew it slowly, Alice saw, to her growing horror, that it was wet, stained in the dark-rust colour of fresh blood.

"How touching," Mr. Wong said sardonically, a unpleasant grin twisting his lips. As he took another step towards Arthur, a frantic Alice searched desperately for some way of stopping this man who'd clearly lost his mind.

_No, no, no! There had to be—_

It was by pure chance that her hands brushed against the fist-sized rocks which lined the gravel path on which she sat. Taking a leaf from King David's book, she hefted a rock in both hands, tossing it wildly in Mr. Wong's direction and hoped for the best.

God himself must have had a hand in that throw, for it miraculously managed to strike the man square in the forehead, instantly knocking him out like the giant Goliath had thousands of year before. The man crumpled to the ground, the gun falling beside him with a jarring thump.

Immediately, Alice was rushing towards the injured Arthur, falling to her knees by his side. "Oh my God, Arthur," she cried, reaching out for him, but he merely waved her away, getting unsteadily to his feet.

"Come on, we've got to go," he bit out, and Alice saw that he was right. The gunshot had alerted security of their whereabouts, and already the grounds by the manor were swarming with men in black, all headed rapidly in their direction.

"Run!" he said, gritting his teeth against the pain. "Go!"

And so, for the second time that night, Alice ran as if the hounds of hell were snapping at her heels, Arthur not two paces behind her. Moments later they'd burst out of the rose garden to find themselves nearing the entrance of a vast hedge maze, its thick, leafy walls stretching up high over their heads. Alice would have stopped to admire the impressive structure had the situation been less urgent, but as it were, she and Arthur only saw their goal in sight, and quickly disappeared into the maze's shadowed depths.

Leaves rustled.

High above, the crescent moon slowly disappeared behind a cloud.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_**Trivia:**_  
_1. References to David and Goliath are derived from the book of 1 Samuel, chapter 17 in the Bible. It tells the story of a young shepherd boy who kills the giant Goliath by a rock and sling, thus winning the war between the Israelites and the Philistines. David later becomes one of the greatest kings of Israel.  
2. 'Hounds of hell' are supernatural dogs in traditional folklore. The most famous of these is Cerberus in Greek mythology, the three-headed guard dog of the underworld.  
3. The hedge maze has always held a special place in fantasy and literature. The one in this story was inspired by various sources - Castlewellan maze in Ireland (which was, until 2007, the largest hedge maze in the world), the Queen of Heart's Maze in the film 'Alice in Wonderland', Labyrinth (of course), and (for the darker elements) Pan's Labyrinth. -I figured, Ariadne, as the architect of the dream, should at least live up to her namesake, yes? =P_

_**Reviews, as always, are food for the soul.** =)_

_o0o_


	14. Act II, Scene VIII

_o0o_

_**A/N: **__Rarely do I write with music on, but when I do, I think it would be rude of me not to acknowledge my musical inspiration, don't you think? (Written with 'I Hope Your Heart Runs Empty' by The Neverending White Lights on constant repeat.)_

'If all the luck in this life has all run  
If all my faith is undone, I had none  
To track them down and take them back where they belong  
Could that explain why I'm here, is that the reason why I came  
And why I feel this way, I feel, I feel, I feel...  
I came apart here.

Stole a look away from your eyes  
Stole a look and finally paid your price  
Tethered fresh, trampled thoughts, look for me  
Look at this face, everywhere there's new mistakes  
And underneath it all, takes its toll, grudgingly  
But with you in here, everything seems okay...'

_o0o_

* * *

**[Act Two, Scene Eight]**

Inside the maze, the long shadows grew and gathered, dancing in gloomy silhouettes along the walls. Alice wasn't sure how long she and Arthur ran, but as each bend and turn and four-way intersection merged into one dizzying rush of dead ends and green foliage, she could only hope that they'd eventually find their way out.

Alice had thoroughly lost all sense of direction and her tired lungs were burning for air when Arthur suddenly gave a groan of pain, collapsing unceremoniously to the ground. Alice spun, turning in his direction.

There was so much blood.

For a second Alice could only stare in wide-eyed horror at the expansive patch of viscous scarlet soaking his once pristine white dress shirt and pressed dark suit. The coppery tang of newly-shed blood mixed in with the lingering crisp accents of Arthur's cologne, and Alice had to grip desperately at something- _anything-_ in order to fight back her swiftly rising nausea.

_Bulletgunwoundshotblood__**ARTHUR**__-_

Alice squeezed her eyes shut, counting backwards from ten as she dredged up whatever memories she still could of the compulsory first aid class from her senior year of high school. When she was certain she'd finally managed to get a firm grip on herself (she'd be no use to either of them in a state of mindless panic, she knew) Alice inhaled a deep, steadying breath, trying to ignore the repulsive smells assaulting her nose, and moved as calmly as she could to kneel beside the injured Arthur.

"Arthur?" she tried. Arthur glanced up, his jaw clenched so tightly that Alice could hear the gnashing of his teeth from this close. He was clearly in a state of agony, but Alice was relieved to see that his eyes were surprisingly lucid. Good. It meant he hadn't gone into shock – yet.

"I'm going to need your Swiss knife," she said quietly, by way of explanation, before quickly reaching into his pant pocket to fish the object out. Now was really not the time to be observing proper etiquette and the strict rules of personal space.

_Stop the blood flow. Put pressure on the wound. _

Alice's hands shook so badly that she almost sliced her own hands open when she began to systemically rip the abundant material of her skirt in long strips, with the assistance of the tiny blade that was proving itself to be surprisingly indispensable over the course of the nightmarish evening. Alice worked as fast and as efficiently as she could until only the underlining and bodice of the once gorgeous dress remained. The scratchy material was diaphanous and insubstantial and utterly inappropriate for bandaging a paper-cut let alone a gun wound, but it would have to do.

Arthur only cried out once when she began to winding over the perforated area. It was high enough on his shoulder that it didn't appear to have punctured a lung (or any other such vital organ), but with her medical knowledge limited to high school biology and the occasional episode of Grey's Anatomy, hers wasn't exactly the most expert of diagnoses. By the time she had tied together a clumsy knot, Alice was swaying on her knees and trying desperately not to vomit, her eyes seeing double from the overwhelming dizziness in her head. Her hands were slick with a warm, sticky substance, and she wiped it hastily on herself before her mind could dwell on what it really was. It left dark, scarlet streaks like a child's finger-painting on the gauzy white layer of underlining, which immediately began to stiffen like drying acrylic paint.

"Thanks," Arthur said, forcing a smile despite the lines of pain etching his handsome face. It came out more as a grimace, but Alice could see the gratitude in his glazed brown eyes.

.o.

It was at this point, to her utter shame, that Alice began to cry.

These were not the graceful, poetic tears of beautiful Dai Yu, mourning her star-crossed, tragic love as she buried fallen petals beneath a dying plum blossom tree. The strain, stress and sheer emotional overload of the last twenty-four hours wracked Alice's thin, shivering frame as she burrowed her head into her knees and shook with heaving, silent sobs.

"I'm sorry! I-I'm so sorry!" she managed between gasping breaths, keeled over with the weight of her own guilt. "This is all-all my fault! If I hadn't gotten you into this mess-"

"Alice!" his voice cracked out like a whip. "This isn't your fault!"

She shook her head madly, the words pouring out in one fervent wave. "But if it w-weren't for me you wouldn't be here and you wouldn't have been s-s-shot and now you're hurt and I can't call an ambulance and oh my God you could- you could die and it's all because-"

"Alice! None of this is your fault!"

Shocked at the sudden raising of his voice (she'd never heard Arthur sound so _emotional_ before), she lifted her head, looking up into his dark, dark eyes that were suddenly bright with a terrible ferocity.

"If I hadn't—" he cut off abruptly, turning his head away, but not before Alice had caught the strange expression that flickered over his face. It looked almost like…

_...Guilt?_

"Just… just please stop crying," he said at last. Reaching into his right pocket, Arthur pulled out a folded white handkerchief, handing it to Alice with the same air of awkward helplessness most men defaulted to when faced with a sobbing woman.

It was a long while before the sniffles stopped, and by the time Alice could actually speak without her voice shaking, the once-pressed handkerchief had turned into a wrinkled, sopping mess. Alice was fairly certain that Arthur wouldn't want it back.

"I'm sorry," she said. With a blotchy face and a decimated skirt and her hair in utter disarray, Alice knew she must look a fright, but at this point; she couldn't bring herself to care. "I'm not usually like this."

The huff of air that Arthur let out was the only laugh he could manage through the pain. "Given the circumstances, I wouldn't exactly call this a 'usual' situation."

"...How are you feeling?" she asked, tentatively broaching the subject.

"I've been better," he replied wryly.

Alice bit her lip. "I'm sorry."

"...Alice." Arthur's voice was flat.

"Yes?"

"Quit apologising."

"I'm sorry!" It was a knee-jerk reflex.

Another huff of almost-laughter from Arthur, before the two descended into silence.

For a long time, Alice stared up into the narrow patch of sky above, lost in her own dark thoughts. "_…Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute_," she mumbled half-consciously to herself. "_And found no end, in wandering mazes lost._"

"…Sorry?" Arthur asked, not quite catching the mumbled words.

Alice shook her head. "…It's nothing."

Another silence.

"I just-" she began, feeling more confused and betrayed and helpless than she'd ever been her entire life. She thought of the Mr. Wong she'd thought she known, with his kind smiles and quiet nature, the absent-minded way he would push up the glasses that constantly slid down his nose, and how utterly different that'd been to the heartless, cold and calculatingly cruel Mr. Wong she'd just seen. "…I don't understand. Mr. Wong – he was like a completely different person. It doesn't make any sense. How could he just—?"

Arthur pursed his lips. "Still holding on to that faith in humankind, I see." It would have been a completely callous statement had there not been a note of genuine curiosity to his voice.

Alice flinched, clinging onto 'that faith' like a particularly stubborn limpet. She couldn't – wouldn't – let Mr. Wong's actions make her disillusioned with the whole world. To do so would only mean a double victory over her.

And Alice flat-out _refused _to let that happen.

"One man is hardly an accurate representation of all mankind," she replied mulishly, and then- "I'm not stupid, you know. I never said that there weren't bad people in this world, people who will pretend to care for you and love you and then stab you in the back. I guess I just… didn't expect Mr. Wong to be one of them."

Arthur clenched his jaw. "He wouldn't be the only one."

Alice looked at him curiously. The way he said that seemed too personal to be just a casual statement of ideological difference. Maybe he'd been betrayed before, too. Maybe… maybe that's what made him so disenchanted with the world? Briefly she toyed with the idea of Arthur as a jilted lover, left at the altar or betrayed by his one true love, before quickly discarding such ridiculously melodramatic notions.

"Mr. Wong had always been so kind," she said instead. "Now… now it's like all of that was an entire hoax, like I'd been living some elaborate lie. I don't even know what's real anymore."

Beside her, Arthur said nothing.

The wind picked up.

"...Before the man tried to shoot you," he spoke up eventually, changing the subject. "He said something about extracting information."

Alice shuddered, not wanting to think about all the creative ways one could use to interrogate and to coerce. "Yes, well, I hope for my sake he won't resort to torture."

"…I don't think he meant it figuratively."

Alice blinked, momentarily confused. What else could he have meant?

"You don't mean…" she said slowly, suddenly recalling a Lancet article she'd perused while waiting for her father in his office when he'd been delayed at a meeting. It'll been lying on his desk, and she'd been bored, and though the words had been far too technical and scientific for her to understand even a quarter of it, it had been either that or the Compendium of Laws on his shelf. At the tender age of fourteen, even the incomprehensible journal article had been the more interesting choice.

"Like… like dream extraction?" she asked, in the same disbelieving tone an atheist would take when discussing the existence of God – or any divine being for that matter. "But isn't that completely in the realms of theoretical metaphysics? Like quantum mechanics, and multiple dimensions and time travel, things like that? Are you telling me it's… physically possible? That it's real?"

His lips curled into an ironic smirk. "…It's very real, Alice."

"How—"

"—You know how I said I'm writing my thesis on intellectual property law and the free market?" he interrupted, having already anticipated the question tumbling from her lips. "Well, that's not entirely true."

Arthur turned, meeting her dubious gaze with dead-serious eyes. "…I also specialise in subconscious security."

o0o

* * *

o0o

'If every moment could have you in it, I know where all my faith had gone  
If any moment should take you away, I know I'll always have this one  
This one, this one, this one...

Of any moment, ever stolen, don't take this one  
As my heart runs empty now I realise  
What I want would never surface otherwise  
I hope your heart runs empty and you realise  
Hold on to this hope, hold on to this hope  
Hold on to all my hope, and my faith  
Because I don't want leave, I don't want to leave, from your life  
Because I want to see, that nothing is faded, that nothing could change it  
Of any moment.'

_Okay. This was one exhausting chapter to write - in more ways than one. Please note that the author has never studied first aid or had to ever deal with a gun, so all information concerning the treatment of bullet wounds comes from good ol' Wikipedia. If there are any inaccuracies, I apologise._

**_Trivia:_  
**_1. Grey's Anatomy - a medical drama on TV that's named after a standard medical textbook which most of my med friends use as a footrest. =P_  
_2. Dai Yu - the female protagonist from Cao Xue Qin's 'Dream of the Red Chamber' - one (if not the) most famous classics in Chinese literature. Dai Yu is commonly remembered for the monologue delivered while sweeping fallen flowers and burying them in the ground._  
_3. The incomprehensible lines Alice mutters is from 'Paradise Lost', an epic poem by John Milton about Adam and Eve and their Fall from Eden.**  
**4. Lancet - a leading academic journal for (predominantly) medicine, but also covers (on occasion) more general sciences. _

**Please review! I'm quite proud of this chapter, but I would love to know what you think, and any suggestions for improvement are greatly appreciated!**


	15. Act II, Scene IX

**[Act Two, Scene Nine]**

"…You're not pulling my tail, right?" Alice asked slowly, briefly wondering if Arthur had gone into shock and she'd simply missed it. He didn't look like he was joking, but then again, Arthur also possessed one of the best poker faces Alice had ever seen.

Arthur shook his head. "Tempting," he replied. "But no. Actually, the fact that Mr. Wong is trying to access your father's secrets through you is probably a good indication that your father has already been trained against extraction."

Alice frowned. "But if _Ba Ba_ knew about extraction, why didn't he train me as well?"

"I would expect," Arthur answered after a moment's pause. "That Mr. Cho was trained in the event someone tries to extract compromising state secrets from him. But it probably never crossed his mind that someone would try to get at him personally through you."

Alice nodded thoughtfully. She supposed that made sense.

"What do you know about extraction?" Arthur asked.

"Not much, just general theory, from what little I've read about it." she admitted. "It's like stealing information from a person's subconscious while in a shared dream-state, right? Like… mind-rape, almost."

Arthur noticeably twitched. "…More or less," he conceded. "Although calling it 'mind-rape' is a bit extreme. The subject of the dream – the 'Mark' – usually doesn't come to any harm during the extraction process. And if it's a successful extraction, then he or she wouldn't even know that it'd occurred at all."

Alice raised her brows. "If a rapist drugs his victim first, so they technically come to no real psychological harm because they don't remember it the next day, does that make the act any more justifiable?"

"That's… different." Arthur grimaced, looking away. "Extraction's just a job. It's not – technically speaking – legal, but it's still a job."

Alice stared, utterly thrown by this indifferent response. "But I don't understand!" she cried. "I thought you study I.P. law, and 'subconscious security' as you say. Isn't that to protect people's creative assets and from having their subconscious invaded without their knowledge or consent?"

"In essence, yes."

"Well, don't you do that because you believe in, I don't know, an underlying fundamental right to personal privacy and the importance of protecting that right, or something along those lines?"

Arthur stared at her, mystified. "…No…?"

"Well, why _do _you, then?"

Arthur smiled. "Because there's nothing quite like it." His reply was immediate and matter-of-fact, but there was something in his voice that belied his passion – that spoke of thrill, and excitement and unbridled joy for what he did. "And because… I like the challenge."

Her jaw dropped. "That's all?"

"Well, it pays well, too. Do I need any other reason?"

"Well, no, I guess, but—" To the idealistic Alice, who saw life in terms of values and meaning and a higher moral purpose, the whole idea of choosing a career path without an ideological reason was utterly incomprehensible. Of course, she had plenty of classmates who had chosen to study law for more pragmatic reasons – prestige, power, or simply to earn a decent living – but most of them still believed in the underlying worth of the justice system, and the contributions they would make to it as lawyers. To have not even considered it at all…

Arthur smirked at her confusion. "Let me guess," he said. "The reason why you want to specialise in family law and mediation is because you 'want to help people'."

"Well, of course!" she replied, utterly bewildered. "Why else?"

Arthur sighed, shaking his head. "…Why else, indeed."

Her eyes narrowed. It sounded almost as if he were laughing at her, and Alice wasn't sure she liked her beliefs laughed at. "Tell me about extraction," she said, returning back to the topic. "What do extractors do, exactly?"

Arthur shifted his body to lean more heavily against the hedge wall at his back, wincing slightly when his tentative actions aggravated the wound more. "When you are dreaming, your natural defences are lowered. Any secret you have, any piece of information in your head is far more vulnerable to theft. A good extractor can enter a subject's consciousness and… 'uplift' that information by entering the same dream-state as the subject. For more difficult jobs, extractors will work in teams. An architect will design and construct the dream-space, which the subject is then brought into."

"So… it's not actually the subject's dream?"

"No. The dreamer is usually the extractor, who learns the design of the dream-space from the architect. The subject simply fills the dream-space with his or her own subconscious, in the form of projections."

"Projections?"

"People, animals, living embodiments of a person's consciousness."

Alice frowned thoughtfully.

"So what do you do?" she asked curiously. "How do you secure a mind from extraction?"

"The projections of a person's subconscious are like the body's white blood cells," Arthur explained. "Eventually, your subconscious starts to pick up on the intrusion, and goes looking for the dreamer. When they do, they converge and destroy."

She gasped. "You mean… they _kill _the extractor?"

Arthur's lips twitched at her horrified reaction. "Not physically – but yes. You die, and then you wake up. Usually."

Alice shuddered. The cavalier way Arthur spoke of death – even if it was only in dreams – was more than a little disturbing. "So… your job's to speed up the process?"

"Pretty much," he replied. "The faster the subject realises they're in a dream, the faster the projections militarise. Hence the training."

Alice nodded, falling silent. For a long time she stared down at her hands without speaking, needing the time to gather her thoughts and properly absorb the astounding information that had been thrown at her in the space of ten minutes. She thought about Arthur, with his ability to navigate both the dreaming and waking states with such lucidity, and found herself suddenly both envious and terrified. How on earth did he manage to stay sane in that perpetually hypersensitive, vigilant state?

"Do you ever… lose yourself?" she wondered. "Aren't you afraid that one day, you won't be able to tell the difference between dreaming and waking?"

Wordlessly, Arthur reached into his right pocket and pulled out a tiny object which he carefully held between his thumb and forefinger. The half-translucent cube glinted in the moonlight, and Alice saw that it was a small red die. "That's why we have totems."

"…Totems?"

"An object you can carry with you at all times that will behave in a certain way only when you're in physical space," he explained. "Mine's a loaded die, but it can be anything really – a spinning top, a weighted chess piece – so long as only you know the weight and feel of it."

"So you won't be caught out in someone else's dream."

"Precisely."

"But... how do you know you won't be caught in your own dream?" Alice asked. At Arthur's puzzled look, she tried to elucidate the scrambled, half-formed thoughts in her head. "Well… you know the weight of the die, how it should roll, where it will land – which means that your subconscious, by default, also knows it, too. So how can you be sure, in your own dream, that your own mind isn't fooling itself?"

Arthur's brows furled, still not quite understanding her meaning. "In dream-space, I can control how the die rolls."

"Yes, but your subconscious knows this because your mind already knows it. If your subconscious is clever enough to control how the die rolls in a dream, can't it just as easily constrain itself – constrain the die to fall the same way as in physical space – too? So how can you be sure that you're not trapped in your own dream – that you're actually in reality?"

Arthur was silent for several beats.

"I suppose you can't." he said finally, before turning to her with an arch of his brow. "But then again, can you _ever _be sure that the reality you perceive is actually 'real'?"

His question dredged up sudden thoughts of her mother, the beautiful, elegant, accomplished woman who'd given Alice her large brown eyes and dimpled smile, a woman now reduced to a shell of what she once was, no longer able to distinguish between what was happening around her and what was happening in her head. _Ma Ma_, who'd buried rice in the garden because "someone had poisoned it", _Ma Ma_, who'd made Alice sit and listen to the voices only she herself could hear, _Ma Ma_, kitchen knife in hand, screaming at _Ba Ba_ with wild, frightened, bloodshot eyes – "I know what you want! I know who you're working for! I won't let you take me or my baby away!"

She'd been too young at the time to understand why her mother was acting so strangely, why the _Ma Ma_ who'd played the piano while she danced and lectured her on her posture and kissed her cheek when she tucked her in at night began to drift in and out of her life. The sometimes sad, sometimes frightened and sometimes uncontrollably angry stranger who took _Ma Ma_'s place terrified Alice, but _Ba Ba_ refused to tell her what was wrong.

It had been her Auntie who'd eventually explained it to her, in as simplistic and patient a manner as a psychiatrist unused to dealing with children could manage. "We all live in our own private bubble of reality," she'd said, using little diagrams to illustrate her point. "We perceive the world as being a certain way because that's the only way our brain has programmed itself to interpret the incoming stimuli. We only appear to share the same common reality because most people's brains are wired in more or less the same way. But there are people like your mother, whose wiring is different, see? And to her, the things she sees and hears that you can't – they're as equally real as the things you _can _see and hear. Do you understand?"

She did.

"...Reality is a state of mind," Alice murmured absent-mindedly to herself.

Arthur looked at her quizzically.

"Never mind," she said, quickly changing the subject. "Are there any side-effects to shared dreaming?"

(After all - as her father often reminded her - nothing came without a price.)

Arthur's eyes grew distant, as he, too, lost himself in his own memories. "…Well, I've gotten pretty used to dying," he said dryly. "And I don't dream naturally any more. I can't."

"Some might call that a blessing," Alice said, after a pause. "...Not me, I'm like you, in a way. I never remember my dreams. When I wake up, only the feel of the dream remains, lingering wisps of half-formed emotions, thoughts, colours, ideas. It's kind of sad, when the dream is a pleasant one, because I can never know what it was. But it's also a relief, because I never have nightmares either."

She sighed, her expression darkening. "But my mother, she remembers her dreams perfectly, and rarely are they good dreams. Snakes, always snakes, and my grandmother's hungry ghost by the side of her bed, who would talk to her in her sleep."

Arthur looked at her curiously, but did not comment. From places not-too-far away, they could hear the sounds of their pursuers combing the winding paths, the security guards that would've surely have had the maze surrounded by now.

They were running out of time.

"Alice," Arthur finally said, his voice bleak. "I don't want to say this, but I don't know how long we can stay here, and I don't think escape is going to be likely at this point. But those people, they'll stop at nothing to extract the information they want to bring your father down. Is there anything you know - anything at all - that they might want?"

Slowly, Alice gave a hesitant nod.

Arthur's brows furrowed.

"I…" he began, hesitating for a second before slowly reaching out to gently cover one of her hands with his. Alice shivered when he ever-so-lightly brushed a calloused thumb against the sensitive underside of her wrist, her pulse beating madly.

"I- I don't want to see you hurt," he said, swallowing convulsively. "But if they find us, I don't know if I'll be able to protect you. The only thing I can do at this point is teach you how to secure your mind, but in order to do that, you have to let me help you." Arthur closed his eyes briefly, his face fighting to keep its generally impassive features, before he turned back to her. "…I need to know what it is you want to hide."

Alice blinked, chewing nervously on her bottom lip. "You need me to trust you," she whispered.

He turned away, jaw clenching, looking almost as if he were fighting an inner battle with himself. For what reason, Alice did not know.

"…Yes," he finally said, turning back to her.

-It was then, lost in that hedge maze with dangers unknown and her future uncertain, that Alice gazed into the steady, pain-glazed eyes of a man who'd taken a bullet on her behalf without a second thought – a man who stirred up the most peculiar, most complex feelings that she'd ever felt -

– and took a leap of faith.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_So, this chapter was philosophy- and ideology- and dialogue-heavy - hopefully it didn't bore you guys too much or sound too 'preachy'. Fear not! Plenty of action to come... =P_

_Thanks again to all my chibi-shadow readers, everyone who has recently added this to their story alert or favourites, and my wonderful regular reviewers - you guys really make my day! =D  
_

_**Trivia:**__  
1. 'Reality is a state of mind' - a theory against the common-sense view of an objective reality independent of our subjective biases purported by (most recently/famously) the quantum physicist and 2009 Templeton prize-winner, Bernard d'Espagnat. Being more of a rationalist/philosophical realist myself, I can't say I agree with him, but many psychologists and scientists do. Meh, each to their own. (As an aside - and for curiosity's sake - can you tell what I study from this story? =P)**  
**2. Hungry ghosts - ghosts of ancestors in Taoist religion that arise from neglect or desertion, or who have suffered violent or unhappy deaths.**  
Not-so-trivia:**_  
_3. Her mother's illness - you probably have a fair idea of what it is by now, but if not, the next chapter should be clarification enough. **In honour of loved ones who battle with mental illness - J.D., J.B.N. & S.W. - you are a gift, and an inspiration.  
**_


	16. Act II, Scene X

**[Act Two, Scene Ten]**

Pushing aside her father's warnings and her own misgivings – the product of a lifetime of secrecy, she attributed the feelings to – Alice anchored herself in Arthur's amber-flecked eyes and grasped for courage. He was gazing at her with that steady, infinitely patient look of his, as if he had all the time in the world to listen to what she had to say, and it was only the blood that was beginning to soak through the makeshift bandage that indicated time was the last thing Arthur had on his side.

"…When I was twelve," Alice began quietly. "My mother was diagnosed with Type I paranoid schizophrenia."

Staring down into her lap, she did not see Arthur's eyes widen.

"Late onset, the doctor said, although back then, I didn't understand what any of this meant." She only remembered the fits, the silence, the stigma, the shame. "_Ba Ba_ wanted to send her away to a private institution to be treated, but _Ma Ma_ refused to go. So my Auntie – _Ma Ma_'s youngest sister – came to live with us. At first, it worked out well enough. Auntie was unmarried, with no family of her own to look after, and, more importantly, she was a psychiatrist who could cater to _Ma Ma_'s needs. And _Ma Ma_, well, she would have her good days and her bad days. On her good days, she was almost like her old self – witty, self-assured, kind, loving – but on her bad days…"

Alice trailed off, reluctant to elaborate. "…Well, it took its toll on all of us."

_'How can this madwoman be my wife?'_ she remembered overhearing her father demand to Auntie, one evening when he'd thought she'd already gone to bed. _Ma Ma _had been particularly difficult that day, and Alice had run back upstairs before she could hear her aunt's reply.

"_Ba Ba _tried to do his best by her, but he was never the most openly affectionate of men, or the most patient. And there was always work, and his public image to uphold, so gradually, he spent less and less time alone with _Ma Ma, _until he stopped seeing her altogether, unless they were forced to be in the same room together. To _Ba Ba_, _Ma Ma_'s illness began to define who she was."

Caught between the two, Alice had tried her very best to keep their dysfunctional family from falling apart, but it only seemed to drive them both even further apart. And then…

"And then," she said haltingly, forming the words of a tale she had told no one else. "One day, I must have been sixteen or seventeen, I walked in on my father and Auntie talking in the kitchen."

"It had been innocent enough, but there was something in his eyes, when he gently took her hand in his. He was looking at Auntie the same way he used to look at _Ma Ma_, back when she wasn't sick. Back when… when he still loved her."

The tumbler in Alice's hand had shattered on the floor in a cacophony of tiny glass shards, and Auntie had immediately snatched her hand away, spinning around to meet the shocked eyes of a seventeen-year-old Alice with apologetic, panicked ones of her own. At the time, Alice didn't know who looked more horrified – Auntie, _Ba Ba_, or herself.

"Of course, Auntie immediately left then, returning to her life back to Shanghai. With her gone, _Ba Ba_ shipped _Ma Ma_ to a private psychiatric centre in England, hoping they would be able to provide the care she needed. She'd been going through a particularly bad patch at the time, refusing to take her meds, and he couldn't cope anymore."

Seacliff, the institution where her mother had been admitted, was a highly reputable, insanely expensive, and most importantly – intensely private – mental treatment centre on the outskirts of peaceful Cambridge. It's proximity to Cambridge University, more than anything else, had played a major part in Alice's eventual decision to study there.

After that incident, life with just her and _Ba Ba _had gone on in much the same way as it always had, but Alice had never gotten used to the lonely, too-silent house with _Ma Ma_ and Auntie gone. _Ma Ma _had been larger-than-life, filling each corner and crevice with her spirit and her passion and her life, and her absence had been like a sudden hollow void in that stately family home that no longer felt like 'family', or 'home'.

"Did your father continue to see your aunt after that?" Arthur asked tentatively. His eyes were bright with curiosity, as well as another emotion she could not place.

Alice shrugged. "Who knows for sure? It'd been by pure chance that I'd walked in on that scene I was never to have meant to see." Her voice grew bitter. "_Ba Ba_'s business trips to Shanghai increased after that, so it would be naïve to presume that he was going purely for 'business'."

Arthur looked pensive. "Do you blame your aunt, then?"

Alice sighed. "I wanted to, I really did," she admitted. "For a while I was so angry at everyone – _Ba Ba_ for being unfaithful, Auntie for being weak, _Ma Ma_ for being sick. But… I don't blame her, not really. I could see that Auntie really loved her older sister, that she genuinely wanted to help her get better. If it weren't for her time and devoted care, who knows where _Ma Ma _would be now?"

('27.5% of schizophrenic patients make an attempt on their own lives', she remembered reading. '12% succeed.')

"I don't know how it happened, exactly, but by the time anyone of us had realised, we'd long fallen into a situation beyond our control. …What was I supposed to do?" Alice wondered helplessly. "How can you choose between two people whom you love equally? I didn't want to help _Ba Ba_ – 'in sickness, in health, for better or worse…' he married _Ma_ _Ma_! He didn't deserve to benefit from his infidelity. All of me wanted to tell _Ma_ _Ma_ the truth. She deserved to know. But _Ba_ _Ba_ had been so tired and defeated and worn-out for so long, and the truth would only break _Ma_ _Ma's_ heart."

And because Alice had wanted them both to be happy – as happy as anyone could be, under the circumstances – she had kept silent.

Alice sighed. So softly Arthur had to strain to catch her words, she said, "My father's too honourable to divorce my mother, but too selfish to let my Auntie go. And even if he could divorce _Ma Ma_, he'd never be able to marry Auntie, or even be with her openly. The scandal would tear our family apart at the seams."

Minutes passed where neither Alice nor Arthur spoke. What could one really say to that?

Alice inhaled a shaky breath.

"…I'm scared, Arthur," she whispered. "If Mr. Wong finds out about this – if he takes it to the press – I can't imagine what the news will do to _Ma Ma_." Being so cut-off from everything at Seacliff, maybe the doctors and nurses there could keep it from her. But there was always television, and newspapers, and magazines… it would be foolish, futile to expect to keep her in the dark forever.

"Hey," Arthur said, entwining his fingers with hers and squeezing gently. His voice was heartbreakingly tender. "Hey. It'll be okay."

Alice looked up, her eyes tracing the smooth lines of his face, the strong angle of his jaw, the fathomless depths of his beautiful, dark eyes.

"Arthur…" she breathed, feeling the earth shift as something shatteringly poignant welled up inside her.

Time seemed to slow as the distance closed between them. Alice leaned forward helplessly, pulled by that invisible, delicate strand of red string that had tied her heart with his, a satellite to a planet's irresistible gravity. For some reason she couldn't stop staring at Arthur's lips, and then their noses were brushing, their faces inches from each other, warm breaths mingling in the still night air. Arthur's eyes were darker than she'd ever seen, and she could feel their pulses race (_hers? his?_) in unsyncopated beats beneath their entwined fingers. She was breathless, suspended, teetering on the edge of a precipice, and the moment stretched, unbroken, between them in a way that was as dizzyingly exquisite as it was frightening until-

"Excuse me while I interrupt this adorable little moment."

It was like being doused with a bucket of icy water. Immediately Alice froze, heart leaping to her throat. Whipping around, she saw Mr. Wong stumbling towards them, gun in hand, a large purpling bruise on his forehead from where the rock had made its mark. He looked more threatening and furious than she'd ever seen.

For one horrific second, Alice's heart stopped.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_Dum dum dum...  
_

_And there's the rub - in whose best interests is the 'right' decision to be made? Can two wrongs make a right? Is truth better than ignorance? Cho Jun Xiang might be a cheating bastard, but does he deserve to have the unsavoury underbelly of his character revealed to the world? If Arthur **does** reveal it, doing the right thing for the wrong reasons, do the ends, then, justify the means?_

_...You tell me. (Thanks, Phil228. =P)  
_

_**Notes: **Schizophrenia is a type of psychosis, a mental disorder which disrupts an individual's ability to distinguish reality from illusion. Schizophrenia is oft-misunderstood as a 'split personality' Dr. Jenkell and Mr. Hyde -esque disorder, and although there is a common perception that schizophrenics are volatile and perhaps dangerous, the truth is that most of those who suffer from this illness are usually a threat to no one but themselves. It is typical for those who suffer from schizophrenia to lack any understanding that they have a disease because in their minds, it's the world that is wrong, not them. While this illness is life-long, and there is no proven cure, patients who receive the appropriate medication and counseling can lead relatively normal and fulfilling lives (although a chief difficulty with treating schizophrenia is that their symptoms often lead to active medicine refusal). In the past, a diagnosis of schizophrenia frequently led to life-long confinement in an institution for the mentally ill. Thankfully, times have changed and this is usually no longer the case, due to a greater understanding of the disease and the development of anti-psychotic drugs and psychotherapy. However, in some parts of the world, the stigma of mental illness is glaringly present, and (as in the case of Alice's mother) the sad reality is that many people still DO get locked away in mental institutions for most of their lives - not really to help the patient, but rather to keep them 'out of sight, out of mind'. _

_o0o_


	17. Act II, Scene XI

**[Act Two, Scene Eleven]**

"This is becoming very trying, Miss Cho," Mr. Wong snarled. "And you, _boy_, are proving to be more trouble than you're worth." Coolly, he raised his revolver. "Fortunately for me, you're also quite expendable."

"NO!" Alice screamed, her white-knuckled hand tightening around Arthur's so tightly that she was sure her nails had pierced through skin. Without thinking, she threw herself between them, her small figure partially shielding the injured Arthur from view. "Don't shoot!"

Mr. Wong paused. "So that's how it is," he said mockingly. "How… sweet."

"Well, Miss Cho," he continued. "Let it never be said that I am an unreasonable man. Why don't you co-operate with me and tell me what I need to know, and I'll let your little boyfriend over there stay alive to take a bullet for you for another day, hmm?"

"I—" Alice began, shivering as a large gust of wind blew in from behind her. Something niggled at the back of her mind. There was something… decidedly _wrong_ about the situation, but she couldn't for the life of her place what it was.

"I—" she tried again. A million different thoughts clamoured for attention inside her mind, and Alice desperately tried to make sense of them all over the pounding of her heart and the throbbing in her head. Frozen stiff, mindless with terror, she could only stare down at the barrel of the gun – a gun that Mr. Wong held cocked and ready in one hand.

—His **right **hand.

.o.

In one shattering instant, Alice felt her whole world tilt, the memories flashing through her mind.

"_It's the ones you place your trust in that hurt you the most."_

(Mr. Wong, poised over a letter, the knuckles of his left hand smeared with blue ink.)

"_How can you be sure that the reality you perceive is actually 'real'?"_

(Mr. Wong, looking up from his desk, a fountain pen cradled in his spidery, awkward fingers. "Why, hello, Miss Cho.")

"_Look, Alice, I—"_

(Mr. Wong, handing her a pressed white handkerchief, an unspoken plea for her to just stop crying. "…Do you want to talk about it?")

"—_It's just a job."_

And suddenly, everything clicked into place.

.o.

"...Mr. Wong is left-handed," she breathed in sudden revelation, watching as before her very eyes the gaunt features of her father's secretary melted into the face and figure of a suavely handsome Caucasian man Alice was sure she'd seen somewhere before.

The fingers that had gripped Arthur's for dear life instantly slackened, as she slowly turned to meet his horrified gaze.

"Alice—" he stammered, guilt and consternation written all over his face. It told Alice everything she needed to know.

Snatching her hand away, she stepped back, her eyes glittering with something a little more corporeal than anger. This- this couldn't be happening to her. It was like someone had taken her heart in their hands and_ squeezed_ – and there was so much pain in that one agonising instant Alice didn't know whether she felt more betrayed, or disillusioned, or… or…

Nothing at all.

"…_Et tu, Brute?_" she whispered sardonically.

"Arthur!" the other man suddenly screamed, as security burst through the hedges, roughly tackling him to the ground. Alice paid him no heed. She continued to stare numbly into Arthur's eyes (such beautiful eyes – such _liar's_ eyes) until a gunshot cracked in the air and 'Mr. Wong's' bullet finally pierced Arthur in the head.

Over the howling of the wind, Alice heard the sound of her heart breaking.

…The world faded away.

o0o

* * *

_o0o_

_**Trivia:** 'Et tu, Brute?' ('Even you, Brutus?' or 'And you, Brutus?') is a poetic phrase used to represent the last words of Julius Caesar, immortalised by Shakespeare in his play, 'Julius Caesar'. __The story goes like this: On March 15 (the ominous 'Ides of March'), Julius Caesar was attacked by a group of senators, including Marcus Junius Brutus, Caesar's close and trusted friend. At first, Caesar resisted, but when he saw Brutus, he supposedly said those words and resigned himself to his fate.__ It is widely used in Western literature to signify the ultimate __betrayal.  
_

_I don't think there is anything else Alice could have said that would be more evocative and more heart-wrenching than those three words. Shakespeare says it all. =P  
_

**_I'd love to know what you think!_**

o0o


	18. End Game

"_What did she say? Arthur? Goddamnit. Talk to me!"_

"_Eames, calm down! Arthur will tell us when he's ready. Right, Arthur?"_

"_Ariadne, love, I don't think you understand. Arthur, as delighted as I am to see you've finally developed a conscience, now is really not the time! If you're letting your emotions get in the way of- oi, where are you going?"_

_.o.  
_

"…_You know, Eames, you really know how to talk to people."_

"_...Shut up, Chemist."  
_

* * *

**[End Game]**

When Alice awoke, she found herself back on the 18.35 to Boston. The other occupants in the carriage had mysteriously disappeared, and the carriage was devoid of everything save for a crinkled novel, a bottle of iced tea and the lone leather travel tote by her side. There was nothing to show that she'd been anything but dreaming blissful, innocent dreams, except the hole in her heart and an ache in her head and a near-invisible mark on her wrist where a needle had pricked.

'19:20' the clock above the door flashed.

The book fell to the floor, forgotten.

-And Alice cried.

o0o


	19. Deck of Cards

**[Deck of Cards]**

Alice wasn't sure how she managed to get herself from the Amtrak North Station in Boston to the steps of the small apartment she shared with Joanna. Her roommate took one glance at her glassy eyes and crestfallen face before yanking her inside, wordlessly digging out the emergency stash of gourmet ice-cream from the back of their pitifully empty fridge. (Neither of them had been in the habit of cooking regularly – neither of them could spare the time.)

True to her nature, Jo' said nothing. She asked no questions and offered no platitudes, choosing instead to give Alice what comfort she could with her familiar, implacable presence. The two girls curled up on their battered living room couch for hours without speaking, until Alice finally succumbed to an exhausted, fitful sleep with her head pillowed on her friend's shoulder, the sticky remnants of chocolate and green tea on her lips.

o0o

* * *

"_So, Mr… ah– Arthur Elliot, is it? Do you have the information I requested?"_

_

* * *

_

o0o

The next morning, Alice found herself dialling her father's number, wanting – _needing _– the confirmation of his good health and happiness, if only for her own peace of mind.

It was Mr. Wong who answered the phone. "…Miss Cho?"

As his voice crackled over the line, for one terrifying second, Alice was gripped with a mindless, irrational panic. _No- he- it couldn't be-_

"…Mr. Wong? Where- where is my father?"

"I'm sorry, Miss Cho. Your father is currently away in a meeting," he replied in apologetic tones. "Is anything wrong? I can page you through if the situation is urgent."

"No- no," she stammered, feeling incredibly foolish as the fear which had seized her immediately faded_. 'Just a dream,'_ she reminded herself. _'Just a dream.'_ "…I mean, that is to say, it's nothing urgent."

"Er- well then, would you like to leave a message?" he asked awkwardly.

_…Same old Mr. Wong._ Alice let out an almost inaudible sigh of relief as the tightly wound ball of tension inside eased a little. "I—" she began, and then stopped, feeling a sudden urge to ask Mr. Wong a question she'd never thought to ask before."Mr. Wong. You've been _Ba Ba_'s secretary for so long. Are you… _happy_ with your job?"

"I'm very happy, Miss Cho. It's an honour to work for your father," he replied without hesitation. In spite of his obvious confusion, his voice was unquestionably sincere. "He is a good man. But – if it isn't too forward of me – what makes you ask?"

"I… don't think I've ever thanked you, for looking after _Ba Ba_ so well for all these years."

"Ah, but it's your father who looks after _me_," he corrected. Even as separated as they were by thousands of miles of ocean, Alice could hear the smile in his voice. "But it's my pleasure, Miss Cho."

Alice bit her lip. "If there's anything we can do for you, please let me know?" she ventured.

"Of course."

"It's good to talk to you, Mr. Wong." (And it was. With the _real _Mr. Wong.)

"You, too, Miss Cho," he replied. "I'll let your father know you called. He will be very pleased to hear from you, I'm sure."

"Thank you. Don't work too hard."

"Goodbye, Miss Cho. Stay safe."

.o.

When Alice hung up, she realised she was smiling.

o0o

* * *

"_We completed the extraction, sir. In regards to Cho Jun Xiang's indiscretions—"_

_

* * *

_

o0o

Time passed, as it always did.

Alice woke up, went to class, went to eat, went to sleep, and then let the process repeat itself, over and over again. If she jumped more at shadows, if she constantly scribbled on Post-It notes to keep track of where she was, if she stared a little more suspiciously at each stranger who crossed her path, no one commented on it. Only the old, grandmotherly librarian noted that Alice no longer sat at her once favourite spot in the university's aged library, and startled in her seat every time a student rally started on the lawns.

As for Alice herself, she threw herself into her studies, hoping that the staid, long-winded cases that made up the majority of her course readings would distract her from the confusion and guilt and self-flagellation that threatened to consume her.

_(How could she have been such a stupid, naïvely trusting **fool**?) _

Days went by, and the 'if-only's and 'what-could-have-been's continued to play round and round her tired head like a broken record that refused to _just **shut-up**_, until reality blurred with fantasy and certainty faded into doubt and Alice began to question whether it had even happened at all.

_(…Was it all just a figment of her deluded mind?)_

.o.

"Okay, consider me cracked. Are you going to tell me what's wrong?" Joanna finally asked, after a week had passed with Alice's paranoid behaviour only worsening by the day. "Because, no offense, you're starting to look like a panda."

"…Don't get me wrong," she added, holding up a pair of brightly manicured hands. "You make a very cute panda. But I'm pretty sure you'd make a cuter fully-functioning human being."

Alice's lips twitched, in spite of herself.

"So, you gonna spill?" Joanna asked. "I won't tell anyone else, I promise. Shrink's honour!"

Alice knew she would keep her word.

Back when they'd first met, she hadn't known what to make of the vivacious, younger girl. Second-generation Japanese-American, Joanna Ito was all long legs and pouty lips, the type of girl who knew exactly the kind of effect she had on men and took pleasure in using it to her own advantage. They'd met on campus because Alice had been looking for a place to stay and Joanna had needed a new roommate. Even though Alice had immediately written the caustically witty yet surprisingly charming Psychology major off, she'd been too polite ("too much of a doormat", as Jo' would say) to say no to sharing the apartment.

Two years later, and Alice couldn't be more glad of the decision. Reluctant-roommate-turned-trusted-friend, Joanna had been so unembarrassed, so shamelessly direct about her brother's illness ("Bi-polar," she'd told Alice not long after they began living together. "And trust me, I've seen enough of the 'And how do you feel about that?' crap he's had to go through that I was, like, 'Okay, that's it, I'm gonna be a clinical psychologist who actually gives a damn'."), that she'd eventually been the only person Alice ever told about her own mother's illness.

_Well, the only person before... _

Her mind veering dangerously down a track she definitely did not want to go on, Alice quickly shoved the unwelcome thoughts aside.

"I'm…" Alice began, and sighed heavily. "Jo'," she said instead. "Do you think I'm… I'm turning into my mother?"

Her friend raised a carefully groomed eyebrow. "Nope, not as of yet," she replied in blasé tones. "But hey, I'm just a psych student. Ask me about bi-polar and I've got it down. Schizo, on the other hand? …Haven't had much experience with it. Apparently we're covering it in class next semester." She shrugged. "But so what if you are?"

Alice stared, jaw open, speechless. "…I'm sorry," she finally managed, after she'd gotten over the shock. "But tell me you did _not_ just say 'So what?' in response to 'Confession: I could have a few screws loose here!'."

"Well, worrying about it won't stop it any," Jo' reasoned, as cool and pragmatic as ever. Nothing seemed to ruffle or shock the girl. "If it happens, it happens – you can't change your genes." She smiled, reaching out to sling an affectionate arm around Alice's small shoulders. "'Sides, everyone has a few screws loose. What's one or two more? Look at me – I'm certifiably insane, and they think my _brother_ is the crazy one."

She winked, and Alice had to laugh, feeling her heart lighten at her friend's lackadaisical words. "Thanks, Jo'. You always know how to make me feel better."

"I live to serve, Alice-_chaaan_!" she replied with a perfectly straight face, before the two friends burst into peals of uncontrollable giggles. When they had calmed, Joanna gave Alice a quick hug, before standing up to check on the roast chicken and potatoes cooking in the oven. "I'm not saying it'll be easy, or that you won't be facing one of the biggest challenges of your life, if it turns out that you are," she said more quietly, the half-joking tone gone from her voice. "But no matter how screwed up you get, you'll still be you, Alice Yue-Ling Cho, and I'll love you just the same."

o0o

* * *

"—_the Mark told us..."_

_

* * *

_

o0o

Two weeks later, Alice found a white tulip lying on her doorstep.

'Alice' the card read. There was no other message.

Her bag of groceries fell from suddenly slack fingers. There could only be one person who would send her flowers – one person who would send her _this_ particular flower – and it was the one person whom she was trying to convince herself didn't actually exist.

('Rosemary for remembrance, tulips for forgiveness', her mother's voice sounded in her ear.)

And suddenly, Alice found herself more furious than she'd ever been in her life. Her hands curled viciously around the tulip's slender stem as she fought the desperate, uncontrollable urge to tear the innocent thing to shreds. Before the neighbours could witness her throwing a supremely unseemly fit of rage on the doorstep, Alice hurled the tulip into the bushes of the apartment building's overgrown garden, where it quickly disappeared behind the drooping rhododendron tree, out of sight.

Alice's hands clenched so tightly that her knuckles went white. After all he'd done, and he thought a _fucking **flower**_ was condolence? It was nothing but a pity offering, the pathetic justification, a victor's final taunt: 'Excuse me while I tear your family to pieces, you know it's nothing personal, right? Sorry, I hope you feel better soon!'

'Well,' Alice thought morbidly. 'At least I know I haven't gone crazy… yet.'

.o.

After that, Alice made sure to keep a constant, watchful eye on the newspapers as the Hong Kong elections grew ever closer, waiting with bated breath and a creeping dread for the news that would bring her whole world crashing down over her ears.

o0o

* * *

"_Well, Mr. Elliot, what did she say?"_

_

* * *

_

o0o

On September 12, Cho Jun Xiang became the Chief Executive of the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong.

The media spoke of Mr. Cho's dedication, his impeccable work ethic, his devotion to the Hong Kong people. They speculated over his effectiveness as the central government's new leader and the changes to policy he planned to implement.

But of scandal, or whispers of infidelity, there was nothing.

.o.

A white rose lay on her doorstep when Alice arrived home that evening, a partially opened bud still wet with dew.

(White for secrecy. White for **purity of intent**.)

Rooted in place, Alice could only stare down at the fragile gift for a long, long time. Slowly, she picked it up, fingering its velvet-soft petals before disappearing inside.

The door closed noiselessly behind her.

o0o

* * *

"…_Nothing. She knew nothing."_

_

* * *

_

o0o

o0o

'I think you can do much better than me  
After all the lies that I made you believe  
And guilt kicks in and I start to see...

...I told myself I won't miss you  
But I remembered what it feels like beside you

I really miss your hair in my face  
And the way your innocence tastes  
And I think you should know this  
You deserve much better than me.

The bed I'm lying in is getting colder  
Wish I never would've said it's over  
And I can't pretend...

I won't think about you when I'm older  
'Cause we never really had our closure  
This can't be the end...'

(**'Better Than Me', Hinder**)

o0o

_**Glossary/Trivia:  
**__1. Please note that any opinions expressed by Joanna do not represent the opinions, views or beliefs of the author. Clinical psychology is a highly specialised field, where different approaches may vary in success from person to person. While Joanna may not believe in the traditional methodology, that is not to say that such methods are ineffective or without merit.  
2. 'Alice-chan' - __the 'chan' suffix is a diminutive suffix in Japanese, it expresses that the speaker finds a person endearing. In general, the 'chan' suffix is used for children, babies and teenage girls. It may also be used for cute animals, close friends, lovers or any youthful woman._  
_3. Arthur's surname - __I'm assuming Arthur would be smart enough to give a fake one. __'Elliot' after the Nobel-winning writer T.S. Elliot, most notable for his poem 'The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock', dealing with spiritually exhausted people in an impersonal post-modern city. __"Prufrock is a representative character who cannot reconcile his thoughts and understanding with his feelings and will. The poem displays several levels of irony, the most important of which grows out of the vain, weak man's insights into his sterile life and his lack of will to change that life. The poem is replete with images of enervation and paralysis, such as the evening described as "etherized," immobile. Prufrock understands that he and his associates lack authenticity. One part of himself would like to startle them out of their meaningless lives, but to accomplish this he would have to risk disturbing his "universe," being rejected. The latter part of the poem captures his sense defeat for failing to act courageously.__" (excerpt by Paul Brians). ...Sounds like Arthur, much? =P _  
_3. The title of this chapter ('Just a Deck of Cards') is a reference to one of the last things Alice (in 'Alice in Wonderland') says before she wakes up from her 'dream'. She is on trial before the King and Queen of Hearts, and in defiance to their ridiculous trial and the end verdict from the Queen: "Off with her head!", Alice shouts in sudden realisation: "You're nothing but a pack of cards!" __**  
**4. Language of flowers - okay, so I'm a bit of a sap. But giving flowers is a very traditional way to express one's feelings, and for the generally reticent Arthur, it's probably the best way.  
_

_**This chapter was probably the most difficult chapter for me to write. PLEASE let me know what you think! ** _

_Not long to go now... =D  
_


	20. Full Circle

_'I don't know you, but I want you_  
_All the more for that_  
_Words fall through me and always fool me_  
_And I can't react_  
_And games that never amount to more than they're meant_  
_Will play themselves out…_

_Take this sinking boat and point it home, we've still got time._  
_Raise your hopeful voice, you have a choice, so make it now...'__  
_

* * *

**[Full Circle]**

At 18:32 on a Thursday evening, a young, impeccably dressed man stood on the platform of the grand Penn station, waiting for the Amtrak Acela Express scheduled to pass through at 18:35. Six months had passed since he'd last taken this trip from New York to Boston, and dressed as he was in pressed black slacks and a thin navy sweater – a starched white shirt and grey tie peeking out beneath the collar – he looked like a typical young man hoping to make a good impression on his first date with the girl of his dreams.

(In one hand, he carried a single blue rose. In the other, nothing.)

At 18:35 on the dot, the train streaked into the station. Smoothly, the man stepped into the carriage, his steps a little too purposeful to be simply choosing a seat. A few minutes later, just as the train began to pick up speed, he quietly stepped into Carriage D.

The carriage was almost completely empty, save for a lone occupant in the furthest stall, a young woman whose face was partially hidden behind a long fall of raven black hair. She did not look up when he entered, too engrossed by the tattered book she held in one hand.

The man's lips twitched.

(It was 'Peter Pan', this time.)

"Excuse me," he said.

The girl froze, her hands clenching convulsively over the pages of her novel at the sound of his (too-familiar) voice. Ever-so-slowly, she raised her head, reluctant to meet his gaze. There was a distrustful wariness in her eyes that the man had never seen before – a wariness that _he _had put there – and something that felt suspiciously like _remorse_ shot through him with an intensity that caught him off-guard.

The man gave hesitant smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a manner that was as boyish as it was handsome. He gestured to the empty seat opposite hers. "Do you mind if I sit here?"

The girl sighed, setting the book gently on the table in front of her.

"…What do you want from me, Arthur?" she asked instead of answering, her voice cool.

(Was his name even Arthur? …She wasn't sure anymore. She wasn't sure of _anything_ anymore.)

"More information? Another secret?" She laughed dully. "I don't know if there's anything that'll beat 'my father is having an affair with my schizophrenic mother's sister' but, please, I'll be happy to oblige."

"-Well?" she asked. "What do you want?"

The man slid into the seat opposite hers.

"…I was hoping for a second chance," he said quietly. "A wise person once told me that everyone deserves to be given the benefit of doubt."

The girl laughed again, but there was hollowness there that the man hadn't ever heard before that afternoon.

"Was there—" she whispered, a terrible sadness drifting beneath the bright surface of her large brown eyes. "Was there any part that wasn't a lie?"

The man looked away. "I am a cynic," he replied eventually. "I like jazz. And the offer of dinner still stands – without any ulterior motives this time."

Face impassive and carefully inscrutable (she doesn't realise how much she looked like _him_, then), the girl simply stared at the man for a long, long time.

"...I haven't _quite_ forgiven you yet, you know."

"I wouldn't have expected you to."

"And I don't dat—" (briefly the memory of the white rose flashed before her eyes – white for secrecy, white for purity, white for **_true love_**) "—_befriend_ criminals, as a matter of principle."

The man raised a brow. "And _I_ don't pursue attachments with a previous Mark, as a matter of principle."

_('Yet here I am'_ hung unspoken between them.)

The girl's lips parted, shocked at this matter-of-fact confession. As the heart-meltingly sheepish smile that she had only ever seen once (in places imagined – not here, not_ now_) broke out over his serious features, she swore her heart skipped a beat.

Hesitantly, he offered her the rose, its colours too vivid to be found anywhere but in dreams.

"…Maybe," he said. "We can work out a compromise."

o0o

* * *

o0o

_**Trivia:  
**1. Excerpt from song - 'Falling Slowly', Once OST  
2. 'Peter Pan' by J.M Barrie is a story which centres around the conflict between the innocence of childhood and the responsibility of adulthood. At the end of the book, Wendy Darling, the main female protagonist learns from her adventure with the 'Boy Who Refused to Grow Up', and leaves the nursery behind to grow as a woman, while still retaining elements of her childishly hopeful nature. It is both a tragedy and celebration of innocence lost.  
3. Due to limitations in natural variance, blue roses can only be made using genetically modified techniques. It is used to symbolise enchantment, mystery and the never-ending quest for the attainment of the impossible.  
_


	21. Initium

_o0o_

…_So there you have it._

_It is by no means a happily-ever-after. He loves his job too much to give it up, and she would never sacrifice her principles for one man's love._  
_They still have so much left to work out, so much to learn and re-learn about each other._

_Is it a relationship doomed from the beginning?_

…_Maybe. But then again, maybe not._

_It is not a happily-ever-after._

**-But it is a beginning.**

_o0o_

**Concluding Notes:**

I confess I started out writing this story for predominantly philosophical reasons. The world that Christopher Nolan had created in 'Inception' fascinated me, and while I was intellectually stimulated by another clever re-interpretation of the existentialist debate, the clinical nature of the film left me feeling rather hollow. (Il)legality of extraction/inception aside (although, realistically, the ample clawback provisions of both American and international corporate law should, in theory, have prevented Fischer's company from gaining a complete monopoly on the energy market in the first place, regardless of Saito's interference... but never mind...), what of the ethics?

And so, an idea began to take hold in my mind.

I wanted to write a story that could shed light on the problem without simplifying it to a straightforward black-and-white issue of right and wrong – because like most things, it's never as simple as right and wrong. I wanted to show that extraction and inception, while not _necessarily _'bad' things in themselves, can lead to bad outcomes. So I imagined the serious and thoughtful Arthur (who, in spite of his intelligence, didn't seem to consider the moral implications of what he was doing at all) in a position where he would have to choose between doing the right thing for the wrong reasons or doing the wrong thing for the right reasons, either of which could be considered equally 'wrong' by different people. And so I needed a new extraction job and a new OC, a blank-slate Mark who was completely innocent and ignorant of dream thieving altogether and who was caught up in the whole business not because of anything she had done herself, but because of the information she might know.

And so the idea began to seed and take root.

I imagined Arthur successfully completing the job, but then feel guilty for doing so. I wanted him to develop a real moral awareness for what he was doing, and in order to do that, I needed him to see the extraction as more than just a job and the Mark as more than just a means to an end. Of course, I could have done so without the romance, but, hey, it's a eminently popular avenue of storytelling, and while love and morality are not mutually inclusive and you can easily have one without the other, often, when we care for someone, we become a lot more aware of 'doing the right thing' where they are concerned.

Along with the ethics of privacy and disclosure involved in invading someone else's mind, I also wanted to touch upon the dream vs. reality debate which formed the philosophical basis of Nolan's film. I hoped to draw parallels between the nature of dreamscaping and the nature of schizophrenia, and, to a lesser extent, the corresponding ideas of Lewis Carroll in his silly but far-from-childish tale 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'.

But most of all, I just wanted to tell a story that others would take as much pleasure in reading as I in writing.

…Twenty chapters, nearing 30000+ words, and 22 very (_very_) sleep-deprived nights later, I hope I've achieved my purpose.

Thank you to everyone who has followed this story, for your support, encouragement and helpful suggestions, you've made this journey – my first real foray the world of fanfiction writing – all the more enjoyable and worthwhile.

I hope you, in turn, have enjoyed this little adventure with Alice.

And so, with her story come full circle, I think it's about a good time as any to bid you all adieu. Perhaps there is so much still, left unwritten and untold, but I believe in crafting beginnings, not endings, and theirs is about as good and as happy as any. What happens next... well, that's entirely up to you.

Maybe we'll meet again, in another fandom.

Until then,  
_**-Mellifluence**_

o0o

**Level One, The Library –**  
Architect: Ariadne (who remains 'up above' to watch over the dreamers' sleeping bodies)  
Dreamer: Yusuf  
Subject: Alice  
Guests: Arthur, Yusuf (as Alice's 'kidnapper'), Eames (as 'Mr. Wong' and Arthur's 'kidnapper')

**Level Two, The Manor House –**  
Architect: Ariadne  
Dreamer: Arthur  
Subject: Alice  
Guests: Arthur, Eames (as 'Mr. Wong')


End file.
